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VITAL QUESTIONS 



PERTAINING TO 



Christian Belief, 




/ BY 

M. RHODES, D. D., 

AUJHOR OF " EXPOSITORY LECTURES ON PHILIPPIANS," « LIFE THOUGHTS 

FOR YOUNG MEN," "LIFE THOUGHTS FOR YOUNG WOMEN." 

"RECOGNITION IN HEAVEN," ETC., ETC. 




PHILADELPHIA: 
LUTHERAN PUBLICATION SOCIETY. 



V 






Copyright, 1886, 

BY THE 
LUTHERAN PUBLICATION SOCIETY. 



The Library 
of Congress 

washington | 



"They shall still bring forth fruit in old age." — Psalm xcii. 14. 



TO 

MY VENERABLE PARENTS, 

WHOM GOD HAS GRANTED LENGTH OF DAYS 

BEYOND THE ALLOTTED TIME, 

AND TO WHOSE CHRISTIAN TRAINING AND EXAMPLE 

I AM LARGELY INDEBTED 

FOR THE TESTIMONY SO CHEERFULLY BORNE HEREIN 

TO THE TRUTH AND POWER OF THE GOSPEL, 

I 

MOST AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATE 

THIS VOLUME. 



PREFACE 



THE present day has called forth so many excellent 
books on the Evidences that a prefatory note 
seems necessary to explain why an additional one, 
having far less claim, at least upon the cultured, should 
appear. These lectures were written during the sum- 
mer of 1885. With two exceptions, some part of each 
was delivered in course to the people whom it is the 
privilege of the author to serve. The one on " Proba- 
tion After Death," and the one entitled " Is the Bible 
Inspired?" were not pronounced in public. In reading 
a number of the books on these and kindred subjects, 
it has seemed to the writer that they were not suffi- 
ciently simple in style, but too full of argument and 
theory, and not practical enough for general reading. 
They seem to be written for professional men, and they 
are chiefly read by these. The age is practical. Men 
are disposed to-day to subject what appeals to their 
faith to the practical test. It is a good omen. Many 
are unable to comprehend argument and logic, while 
philosophical and theological terms are word mys- 
teries to them, but they readily see practical results. 
All can look at the sun, but few can analyze the light. 
Christianity has nothing to lose, infidelity nothing to 
gain, by this test. In some limited way it is the aim 

(v) 



VI 



PREFACE. 



of this book to present Christianity and Infidelity in 
their practical results, and to ask that they be judged 
upon their own merits. It has been the author's 
desire to speak to the people, with young men especi- 
ally in mind. The range of subjects is neither large 
nor new, but sufficient to include prevalent forms of 
error, and those great truths which are essential to the 
experience and maintenance of the Christian faith. So 
far as it has been possible I have named the authors 
from whom I have quoted, without marring the page 
with unsightly foot-notes. In the chapter on the 
" Divinity of Christ," I must, however, acknowledge 
my special indebtedness to an excellent work by Prof. 
Godet, entitled " The Defence of the Christian Faith." 
With little that is new, but with nothing that is not 
worthy the prayerful consideration of all who are dis- 
turbed with doubt, I commit this unpretentious book 
to the candid consideration of all into whose hands it 
may fall, and invoke upon it the blessing of the triune 

God — Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. 

M. R. 
St. Louis, Mo. y April, 1886. 



CONTENTS 



CHAPTER I. 

PAGE 

The Folly of Atheism 9 



CHAPTER II. 
Has God Made Any Revelation of Himself to Man? . . 29 

CHAPTER III. 
Can We Dispense With God ? 52 

CHAPTER IV. 
Is the Bible Inspired ? 75 

CHAPTER V. 
The Divinity of Jesus Christ 99 

CHAPTER VI. 
Probation After Death . . . 128 

CHAPTER VII. 
Some Causes of Infidelity 155 

(Vli) 



Vlll CONTENTS. 

PAGB 

CHAPTER VIII. 
Some Weaknesses of Infidelity 177 

CHAPTER IX. 

The Power and Excellence of The Christian Faith Con- 
trasted with The Weakness of Infidelity 198 



CHAPTER I. 
THE FOLLY OF ATHEISM, 

ATHEISM is the last ditch of infidelity. In it the 
fretting sea of unbelief becomes bottomless and 
shoreless — a wild, hopeless waste. He who denies 
the existence of a personal God has thrust himself 
out of all order, assailed the citadel of his own life, 
put a scar on his own character, and to the vision of 
good men and of angels, is a wandering star reserved 
unto darkness. The announcement of the presence of 
such a man is a shock to everything noble in us, and 
we shrink from his touch as we would from the em- 
brace of a leper. Our indignation kindles to fever 
heat, and words of severe condemnation leap quickly 
to our lips, when we see a child inflicting cruelty upon 
a kind mother, or when we know a husband to be 
guilty of disloyalty to a faithful wife ; but what shall 
we say of the man who by unreasonable and malicious 
denial buffets the cheek and stings the heart of 
Him who set and keeps his pulses going, and has 
arranged, at such unspeakable outlay, that in the great 
soul that throbs within him, and in all the varied 
charm and opportunity of life, he may go down his 
pilgrim way, more cheered with the notes of a psalm 
than saddened with the sighs of a requiem. In such 
I* (9) 



IO 



VITAL QUESTIONS. 



a case we cannot resist the feeling that violence has 
been done to all that is holy and true and beautiful; 
and it is not without a significance that carries testi- 
mony with it, that every corresponding element in us 
should instinctively rise to rebuke the offender. I 
confess to a feeling of horror at sight of a bald and 
boastful atheist. I have met a man who cannot be- 
friend me, and to whose manhood I could not entrust 
the protection of my hearthstone. The resonant air, 
the sunlight, every lustrous star, the singing birds, the 
flowers, the whole face and voice of nature, join in 
severe condemnation of the ungrateful creature who 
can so wantonly violate the love of Him in whom, 
deny it as he please, he lives and moves and has his 
being. Do these words seem harsh? How can we 
be true, and meet the dreadfulness and iniquity of so 
monstrous an absurdity with milder utterance ? 

An unqualified atheist, I hold, is without self-respect; 
he has discrowned himself; he has consummated the 
dreadful work commenced by sin in the garden ; the 
lingering vestige of the holy image is blotted out — and 
what shall we say of an iniquity that leads a man to 
tramp with unhallowed feet over everything noble 
within him, and to exalt to coronation all that is lowest? 
Has not an avowed atheist always been an unseemly 
wonder in the world? "People in many parts," an- 
other correctly observes, " would turn out and look at 
a real and avowed atheist, just as they do at some 
singularly huge and foreign animal, with mingled 
astonishment and alarm. ,, Why should it not be so ? 



THE FOLLY OF ATHEISM. I I 

Would we not stare at the man who with pretense 
would come among us to deny the existence of the 
air and the light ? Far more shall we not wonder at 
and shrink from the man who, enveloped in awful 
shadows, with no hope beaming in his face, and no 
uplifting joy singing in his heart, and with his hard 
brow set toward the heavens, calls belief in a personal 
God a silly delusion ? 

Atheism is itself strong testimony against truth and 
honesty. It strikes at the very source of these. 

Dr. Arnold was right when he said — " I confess 
that I believe a conscientious atheist not to exist." 

When a man denies the being of God, the moral tone 
of his conscience is gone, his faculty of proper dis- 
cernment is destroyed. The atheist is at war with 
himself; his lower nature is imperial over the higher ; 
he has plunged out of the orbit of order; his attitude 
is defiance to all good. How can he be sincere? 
Atheism and a correct conscience never held sway in 
the same soul. In our time this final feat and victory 
of unbelief has found it well to look a little more to 
character, and hence among those who pretend to 
think, it has sought companionship with science and 
to clothe materialism with a new dignity. Scientific 
terms and theories are employed to account for the 
material universe, independent of a personal God. 

Matter is credited' with an all-sufficiency which is 
proclaimed as the mysterious but adequate solution of 
the mighty problem of creation. But the best sense 
of the race revolts at these conclusions, while the best 



12 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

scholarship of the time has not failed to vindicate the 
old and truthful revelation by. exposing the absurdity 
of a view which in striking out the name of God, 
destroys at the same time the best aspiration and hope 
of the human soul. 

I wish to refrain from the use of scientific terms and 
theories in these addresses ; first, because I have 
nothing to sustain even an appearance of pedantry, 
and secondly, because I wish to maintain their simple 
and practical character, so that the most ordinary 
reader may easily comprehend them. Nor will I vio- 
late this purpose if I say here that it has been con- 
clusively shown, as I think, that while the much 
mooted evolution and development theory is not with- 
out some grains of truth, it is sadly cumbered with the 
fanciful and the absurd. To development after God 
and because of Him, we make no complaint ; but as a 
reasonable and satisfactory account of the origin of 
the material universe, including man, the theory is a 
monstrous absurdity. 

Its acceptance breaks up the harmony of the world ; 
between the supposed cause and the manifest effect, 
there is a disparity which contradicts the presump- 
tuous hypothesis; stars and suns, systems and seasons, 
cease any longer to make helpful revelation to man, 
and the blackness of darkness settles upon his be- 
wildered mind. I refer to this- materialistic theory 
not to discuss the question, for I candidly think that 
would be superfluous, but to indicate perhaps the 
most effectual source of atheism in our time. 



THE FOLLY OF ATHEISM. 1 3 

But after all, the universal cause of this vortex of 
unbelief, as with infidelity, is a corrupt heart. The 
wish is father to the thought. It must be in the 
nature of the case, that who braves the venture of 
denying the Divine existence, must first wish it to be 
so. The profoundest and best intuitions of the soul 
must first be perverted. In that attitude there can be 
no courageous repose in any event, and if any faculty 
of the man's being should perchance rebel at the 
fearful assumption, misery must inevitably follow; 
hence the victim at whatever violence must have the 
fortification of his own heart's wish at the beginning. 
The atheist, from his bad eminence, looks up at the 
vaulted sky, all untouched of God, first in his wish 
and then in his creed. Two facts precede this fright- 
ful precipitation. 

The first is the progress of infidelity. Few men, I 
think, begin with atheism. The declivity of evil either 
in unbelief or conduct is # seldom made at one leap. 
Some men wander back from the revelation of God to 
His utter abandonment from mind and soul. They 
deny the Christian Scriptures, descriptive of God's 
character and purpose, and while they are not testi- 
mony in proof of His existence, yet they confirm with 
undoubted emphasis the evidence deduced; and now, 
with this revelation of God out of the way, what more 
natural and likely in many a one at least, than the 
final step from practical to absolute atheism ? 

The second cause is the growing mastery of the 
lower nature. Many a man by a gradual process of 



14 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

moral hardening and vicious habit has driven himself 
into unbelief of God. The abandonment of course is 
without reasonable defense, or mite of comfort ; it is 
simply the state and desire of the victim's heart — at 
the centre of his life, aye, in what God would make its 
holy of holies, he says there is no God. Than this 
man, no more dreadful or pitiable victim exists. Let 
us hope for the sake of our common humanity that the 
number of these is not large. The fact is, atheism is 
such an utter violation of all reason and excellence, 
that it is not without significance that it has never 
been able to gain a wide and permanent mastery in the 
world. There is a lesson in the transientness of the 
dreadful evil. 

History furnishes no proof that rational beings can 
endure long, nor advance under the bondage of athe- 
ism. In the silent roll of the centuries no command- 
ing voice comes forth to champion this monster delu- 
sion. It has had its limited following, but where is its 
temple lifting up its black dome to the heavens, defy- 
ing the progress of the ages ? There have been brief 
periods when God's sceptre seemed to be broken, 
communities seemed to be in bondage to the monster, 
the sky seemed to shrivel to dust, and the hands of 
the clock of progress seemed to move backward or to 
stand still. We have read of one nation rising up and 
in the rage of every bad passion outvoting God. But 
these periods have only been occasional a$d brief, and 
have invariably been followed with a great cry for 
God's return. The fruits of atheism, as of infidelity, 



THE FOLLY OF ATHEISM. 1 5 

furnish unanswerable testimony against it. A new- 
born infant can more easily do without its mother 
than this world can do without God. Plutarch says : 
" There has never been a state of atheists. If you 
wander over the earth, you may find cities without 
walls, without king, without mint, without theatre or 
gymnasium; but you will never find a city without 
God, without prayer, without oracle, without sacrifice. 
Sooner may a city stand without foundations, than a 
state without belief in the gods. This is the bond of 
all society and the pillar of all legislation." 

Faith in the being of God lies at the foundation of 
all religious belief; without this, religion is gone, wor- 
ship is abandoned, and reverence is exchanged for pro- 
fanity. But this first belief has a still wider meaning. 
It means the recognition and noblest exercise of per- 
sonal responsibility; and with this the peace and order 
of society, and the only hope of a permanent civiliza- 
tion are secured. 

Atheism enthroned means revolution, anarchy, and 
hopeless ruin. Could it obtain, the sooner this fair 
earth were whelmed in destruction the better. 

A nation absolutely given up to atheism would be 
hell outdone, for even there a belief in a just and a 
holy God is a check on defiance. But it cannot ob- 
tain, for God is. His purpose is inwoven with the 
wide recognition of His Being, and in the material 
universe, as well as in those who reverence the Holy 
Name, He will never be without a witness. His way 
is in the sea, and His path is in the great waters. The 



1 6 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

proclamation of the Divine existence neither depends 
nor waits upon any proof of ours. 

The invisible things of Him from the creation of the 
world are clearly seen, being understood by the things 
that are made, even His eternal power and God-head. 
— Rom. i. 20. 

The heavens declare the glory of God ; and the firma- 
ment show eth His handy-work. — Ps. xix. I. 

Atheists secure no advantage by challenging us to 
prove the Divine existence. On the other hand, we 
affirm that the existence of God is not simply a mys- 
tery, but that it is the culmination of all mysteries. 

To attempt to establish the great truth by any mere 
process of logic and argument would be presumptu- 
ous. Mortals are not equal to such an undertaking. 
Canst thou by searching find out God? — Job. xi. 7. 
It is not to be done by human ingenuity and human 
argument. In ourselves, in the world about us, numer- 
ous and marvellous facts crowd upon us, overpowering 
the reasonable and enlightened mind, and in a great 
choral of voices speak with majesty of eloquence the 
Omnific Name. But if we are baffled by any attempt 
to prove that God is, by mere logic and argument, 
what shall we say of the brazen presumption of any 
effort to disprove the Divine existence? The difficulty 
is vastly greater here, and yet the atheist to be consist- 
ent is driven to it. His denial at best is poor enough, 
but if he cannot sustain it by any reasonable argument, 
he must fall with his theory. What a task he has on 
hand ! When I think of men, often ignorant, always 



THE FOLLY OF ATHEISM. I J 

wanting in reverence, attempting to disprove the Divine 
existence, the trenchant and just verdict of the Psalmist 
is forced upon me with an irresistible emphasis : The 
fool hath said in his heart, there is no God. In addi- 
tion to the awful daring of the achievement, consider 
the scope of knowledge which it implies. Does this 
man sufficiently comprehend the secrets of the uni- 
verse, has he sufficiently explored and mastered its 
boundless bound as to assure us, that as with his own 
mind and heart, God is not in it ? Unless he is abso- 
lutely all-knowing, how is he competent to settle a 
question of such illimitable magnitude ? Besides such 
rash irreverent presumption, the hasty venture of Uz- 
zah, when he clutched the ark of God with unholy 
hands, challenges our compassion. 

A single foot-print disclosed to Crusoe the fact that 
another human life than his own inhabited the lonely 
island, nor was the conclusion difficult or irrational. 
But had he not seen the foot-print he would have 
needed greater knowledge, an entire acquaintance of 
the island, before he would have been competent to 
prove beyond question that he was not its only occu- 
pant. 

When science attempts to disprove the Divine exist- 
ence, I am more impressed with its pitiable limitation 
than with its superior knowledge; and what shall I 
say of the flippant assertion of many whose distinction 
is their ignorance of themselves and of the wonder- 
world in which they live ! The unbeliever may express 
doubt about the Divine existence, but when he goes 



1 8 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

beyond this, common sense and intelligence revolt at 
his folly. The enameled skin of an apple, and the 
downy rind of a peach, the uniform mathematical pro- 
portion, so marked in nature, furnish ample evidence 
of a designing Mind; the foot-prints of Jehovah are 
everywhere; — but change the proposition from affirma- 
tive to negative, and no such limited knowledge and 
experience will be adequate to sustain it, and if the 
atheist cannot give a reasonable and satisfactory answer 
for the un-faith that is in him, of what w r orth his asser- 
tion ? Foster, in his essays, presents this thought w T ith 
force when he says : " The wonder then turns on the 
great process by which a man could grow to the im- 
mense intelligence which can know that there is no 
God. What ages, and what lights, are requisite for 
this attainment ! This intelligence involves the very 
attributes of Divinity, while a God is denied. For un- 
less this man is omnipresent, unless he is at this mo- 
ment at every place in the universe, he cannot know 
but there may be in some place manifestations of a 
Deity by which even he would be overpowered. If he 
does not absolutely know every agent in the universe, 
the one that he does not know may be God. If he is 
not. himself the chief agent of the universe, and does 
not know what is so, that which is so may be God. 
If he is not in absolute possession of all the proposi- 
tions that constitute universal truth, the one which he 
wants may be, that there is a God. If he cannot with 
certainty assign the cause of all he perceives to exist, 
that cause may be God. If he does not know every- 



THE FOLLY OF ATHEISM. 1 9 

thing that has been done in the immeasurable ages 
that are past, some things may have been done by a 
God. Thus, unless he knows all things, that is pre- 
cludes all other divine existence by being God himself, 
he cannot know that the Being whose existence he re- 
jects does not exist. But he must know that he does 
not exist, else he deserves equal contempt and com- 
passion for the temerity with which he firmly avows 
his rejection, and acts accordingly." 

Thus it is clearly shown that there is in the very 
constitution of the mind, in the limitations by which 
we are surrounded, as well as in the great infinity that 
baffles us on every hand, an ever-present hindrance to 
the possibility of disproving the Divine existence, and 
the awful presumption of the attempt proves its blush- 
less absurdity. 

But what may be entirely clear to some may not 
appear so distinct to others. The mind that is given 
to doubt, or that possibly has ventured into the star- 
less night of atheism, will need some evidence palpable 
and convincing, to recover and stay it. Happily, it is 
facts rather than theories we have to deal with in set- 
tling this vital question. 

God does not come to demonstrate the problem of 
His existence by any distinct revelation. He did not 
create the world, nor give us the written word, simply 
to announce the fact of His own existence, though 
they both reveal to us that He is ; but rather to show 
what He is, and in what relation He stands to us. As 
Bacon says, " God never wrought a miracle to con- 



2Q VITAL QUESTIONS. 

vince atheism, because his ordinary works convince 
it." The natural world reveals God by revealing His 
character and purpose. 

Whether we look at it in its majestic wholeness or 
in detail, we feel at once that above this wonderful 
harmony, this indescribable beauty and order and 
adaptation, there must be a great First Cause, in 
whom an infinite wisdom and goodness and power 
concentrate. We may attribute the vast machinery 
and unbroken order of the universe to inexorable law, 
or to what we please, still the human mind at its best 
will insist upon a Supreme Intelligence whose arm 
girds every law, and whose will controls every spring 
of the stupendous movement. The baffling wonder 
of creation is too much to find satisfactory solution in 
any theory that falls short of an Infinite Mind. The 
atheist says that he believes in cause, but his view 
necessitates a series of causes, a chain of interminable 
links — but to enlightened reason that is not a cause 
which is endless. A cause implies somewhere a stop. 
Forever going back from cause to cause is not finding 
an original cause. The cause that satisfies us, the 
cause that is in harmony with the universe, is an ade- 
quate First Cause, and this First Cause is the " un- 
caused cause," of all things — is God. The attributes 
of this First Cause, as I have intimated, must be de- 
termined, in so far as it is possible to interpret them 
out of the material, from the character of the universe. 
But that there must be an Eternal, Self-existent, Un- 
changeable Being, is certain. The voice of reason and 



THE FOLLY OF ATHEISM. 21 

Scripture is one here. The sublime language of the 
ancient seer proclaims the united verdict — Before the 
mountains were brought forth, or ever Thou hadst 
formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to 
everlasting \ Thou art God. 

Creation is such an illustration of power and wisdom 
as continually to confirm the Scripture statement of its 
origin. When men have examined all theories, save 
with exceptions which are rare, their restless souls, 
driven and tossed they knew not whither, have come 
back to find repose in the simple sublime truth which 
proclaims God the Creator of all things. Faith rest- 
ing on this unshaken rock looks up, and to the ques- 
tion, Whence the light? answers — God made it. 
Whence the darkness ? He spread its sombre curtain 
and filled its folds with a strange quiet. Whence the 
stars? He kindled their fires, and at His bidding, like 
an army with plumes of light, they march peacefully 
over the plains of heaven. He has set His tabernacle 
in the dewdrop as well as in the sun. Every leaf, 
every spear of grass, is a waving banner on which I 
spell His name. It is God I see in this great world- 
house. He built it and He sustains it. The structure 
of the universe makes this conclusion inevitable, if we 
are to respect our reason. As Mr. Pearson correctly 
says, " It matters not whether it be in the department 
of zoology, with its two well-established principles, 
that there is no such thing as spontaneous generation, 
and that there is no transmutation of the species; or 
whether it be in the deoartment of a sublime and ever- 



22 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

enlarging astronomy — it matters not whether we ex- 
tend our survey to the systems of suns that roll 
throughout the immensity of space, or whether we 
centre it on that wondrous microcosm, the human eye; 
we meet with teeming evidences of design, which not 
only carry us to a designer, but hand us over neces- 
sarily, if we may so speak, to the belief that the Great 
First Designer is God." 

Mark the difference ! The atheist asks us to aban- 
don God. Suppose I adopt his creed ; the dark night 
has settled about me, the light has faded from the 
stars. I have nowhere to go, and am like a lost child 
crying in the night. He plunges me into the deepest 
gloom and gives me no torch, and I can only grope I 
know not whither. 

I cannot accede to his request; his account of crea- 
tion violates my reason, it blushes my intelligence, 
chills my heart, and intolerable gloom crowds in at 
every door of my soul. 

Is not this a fair illustration of his reasoning ? A 
chair could never have made itself, but the sun is self- 
created. Your coat had a maker, but your soul had 
none. The wax flower on your table was formed by 
the skilled fingers of a human being, but the rose and 
the lily in your garden grew by chance. The great 
organ with its choral of trumpets was fashioned by one 
who had long studied the art, but the human voice, the 
grandest of all organs, was self-created. The King's 
crown was wrought by the artisan, but the starry 
dome above us, the crown of this fair world, was lifted 



THE FOLLY OF ATHEISM. 23 

up by some ponderous evolving of things, or some 
prodigious feat of law. Is he not a monster of incred- 
ulity who can bring himself to embrace so absurd a 
folly ? 

It is not without significance that the greatest minds 
have been compelled to ascend from nature to nature's 
God. Over that radiant stairway the noblest of earth 
have gone to the throne of the Eternal, and laying the 
tribute of their faith, love and obedience at His feet, 
have found that He who fills immensity with His pres- 
sence, is pleased also to dwell in such as be of a con- 
trite heart. The sublime word is true. The worlds 
above and the world below have but one voice. In 
the beginning god created the heaven and the earth. 

But from the material world let us take a step 
higher, and see if we cannot find in man such evidence 
of a Supreme Being as will add strength to the proof 
already deduced. If we may discover so much evi- 
dence of design in the lower forms of creation, surely 
we shall not fail in the higher. Man is more than an 
animal. He is endowed with such superiority of fac- 
ulty as to make him supreme in the material world. 
It was in reverent recognition of a power above him 
that the Psalmist wrote, / am fearfidly and wonder- 
fully made. The appeal is direct when the same 
writer elsewhere says : Thou hast made him a little 
lower than the angels, and hast croivned him with 
glory and honor. 

It was Pascal who said, " I am greater than the sun." 
How so? "The sun could fall and crush me, but I 



24 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

would be conscious of defeat, whilst the sun would be 
unconscious of victory/' Man can think. Did not 
some one greater than he think before him ? His men- 
tal constitution alone speaks for God. We have already 
seen that there is an intellectual necessity for a " First 
Cause, Himself uncaused and the cause of all." What 
witness does the moral nature afford? What saith the 
heart ? The heart, when man is at his best, and some- 
times when he is not, goes out to God. We carry 
within us a sense of dependence upon One abovfe us. 
When the limitations of human life baffle us, — when 
unexpected peril confronts us — there is something in 
man's nature that instinctively cries to God. As Augus- 
tine beautifully puts it: " Thou hast made the heart for 
Thyself, and it is ever restless until it finds its rest in 
Thee." 

The body can become the temple of the Holy Ghost, 
because man has a heart. I know unbelievers often 
place but little confidence in such testimony, for who 
can take so absurd a theory as atheism to his bosom, 
is likely to have little faith in his kind. If we cannot 
trust the profoundest feelings of our nature, and the 
noblest as well, what can we trust? Certainly it is not 
without significance that this sense of dependence and 
yearning toward God is an effectual corrective ; the as- 
piration always contributes to the best elements of 
manhood. Out of this heart-yearning comes the sub- 
lime attitude and voice of prayer. Whence this yearn- 
ing? We answer from God, who is also its satisfac- 
tion. The heart is a greater witness than the intellect 



THE FOLLY OF ATHEISM. 25 

" 'Tis the heart and not the brain, 
Which the highest doth attain." 

But what saith the conscience ? 

This strange monitor, this awful sentinel, keeping 
watch at the gates of my soul, filling me with a sense 
of obligation and responsibility, smiting me with severe 
but just penalty when I do wrong, and approving me 
as readily when I do right. Can I be true to myself 
and not ask whence this imperial prince among my 
faculties ? If there be no God, why regard my con- 
science or recognize the sense of obligation and respon- 
sibility with which my soul seems girded ? What is con- 
science but the solemn voice of man's nature responding 
to the Being of God? It must be regarded as one of 
the strongest bulwarks against the mastery of atheism ; 
and as atheism means its degradation and overthrow, 
we can easily see what awaits the community, the 
home, or the individual in whom the giant folly obtains 
dominion. Who is loyal to his conscience, will guard 
his manhood, and never abandon faith in the Divine 
existence. "This theology of conscience," says Dr. 
Chalmers, " has done more to uphold a sense of God 
in the world than all the theology of academic demon- 
stration." Kant in his keen criticisms, while denying 
other witnesses, was baffled by the witness of con- 
science, and looked upon it as furnishing a sufficient 
basis for faith in a personal God. I cannot wonder 
that great intellects in all time have stood in reverent 
awe of this witness, for — 



26 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

"Whatever creed be taught, or land be trod, 
Man's conscience is the oracle of God." 

Closely allied to this is the testimony of the souL 
This is man's sublimest distinction. His self-conscious- 
ness is involved in it. Really the soul is the man. Of 
what a wonder of thought and feeling it is susceptible ! 
Overborne often by the depraved will and corrupt heart, 
it betimes plumes its wings for a flight more worthy of 
it. What if it often fails in these better aspirations, — 
indeed only can fail, until healed and retuned by the 
hand that first kindled its life,: — still the evidence of a 
master power and of a sublime origin is there. 

Broken, soiled, enslaved, is not the remnant of God's 
image hidden beneath the marred beauty of that sub- 
lime ruin ? Can any power rescue it, or satisfy its 
better yearnings, but the power that created it? 

The history of mankind, and the most intelligent 
and excellent experience of men in all ages, certify that 
God only is its strength and portion forever. The 
body wears and wastes with age, its forces vanish, it 
covets the dust at last, and finds it; but the soul at 
its best kindles with new hopes, throbs with increased 
vigor, and takes on a holier transfiguration as time 
passes. 

Eternity seems to be its native sphere, God Himself 
its glory and crown. True to itself, like conscience, 
it never fails to own its Divine paternity. 

Let him who can, challenge the imperial witness. 
Over all the senseless folly of the unbeliever, the soul 
with one voice proclaims and demands a personal 



THE FOLLY OF ATHEISM. 2J 

God ; and when it sweeps its master vision over earth 
and sky, it is not its weakness, but an evidence of its 
better life and homeward flight, that it is compelled to 
exclaim — Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord 
God Almighty. 

" There's nothing bright above, below, 
From flowers that bloom to stars that glow, 
But in its light my soul can see 
Some feature of the Deity." 

Nor is it without significance that as the soul comes 
to own God as its Father, it aspires to Him. The 
soul's proper development, its purest joy and sublimest 
liberty, lie in this proper recognition of God. When 
the inspiring idea of God attends the course of man's 
thinking, the quality of his thought is changed ; the 
face and purpose of life become clear and bright ; his 
tone is subdued into veneration, and his inquisitiveness 
is chastened into worship. God has commenced to 
speak within him. 

Now for these great peculiarities in man, struggling 
up in so noble a manner, like a lark seeking its native 
air in the morning, toward some infinite source where 
they may find a companionship and enlargement wor- 
thy of them, we must account. Whence did they 
come, and what testimony to their lofty source do 
they furnish? These supreme attributes in man's 
nature, beyond question, point to and came from God. 
"With the image of God before us, who can doubt 
of the divine type ?" 



28 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

" The chain of being is complete in me ; 
In me is matter's last gradation lost, 
And the next step is spirit — Deity," 

Who puts thought into the creed, spirit and pur- 
pose of his life, cannot be base, and will wish to be 
holy. 

But of the moral influence of Theistic belief, as over 
against the debasement of atheism, we shall speak 
farther on; meanwhile let us bow our souls before the 
one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through 
all y and in you all. To whom be glory forever. Amen. 






CHAPTER II. 

HAS GOD MADE ANY REVELATION OF HIMSELF TO MAN? 

CAN God be known? Has He made any distinct 
revelation of Himself to His creature man ? Cer- 
tain skeptical philosophers affirm that he has not. If 
there be a God, they claim that He is unknown and 
unknowable, in which case we are asked to go back 
to the pagan Greeks, whom Paul confronted and con- 
founded, and inscribe on our religious altar — To the 
unknown God. Startling theory this ! — a reproach on 
human intelligence, a most depressing hindrance to all 
that is noblest in life, a clean blotting out of any hope- 
ful destiny for man, and last, but not least, a harsh re- 
flection on both the wisdom and goodness of God. 

With the Divine existence clearly established, we 
are asked to believe that God has not made Himself 
known, or if He has, that we have no faculty to interpret 
the revelation. We have no means of knowing His 
will. In all the world about us, no light illumines our 
way to Him, no voice calls to us out of the stillness ; 
the light discovers to us no page on which an outline 
of human duty may be traced ; no interpreting beam 
falls on any perplexing question of human life; no 
word of comfort speaks from the shadows ; God made 
us, but He scorns care of us ; He gave us mastery over 



30 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

all else about us, but the gates of His heart and home 
He has closed against us. He never visits His own off- 
spring, and though He pours out of His mighty stores 
the sunshine and the showers, and w T afts the cooling 
and healthful winds across the continents, He never 
sends any holy, helpful message to those upon whom 
He has imprinted His own image. This is the cheer- 
less faith or unfaith of the religious Agnostic. 

Infidelity is nothing if not depressing. If it attempts 
to speak with rhythm, its music is always set to a 
minor key. Its song is a dirge. To sing it in the day 
with face upturned to the sky, is to mock the sweet 
and joyous light. It gropes in the dark and cries — 

" If God there be, or gods, 

Without our science lies ; 

We cannot see or touch, 

Measure or analyze : 

The self- moved force that brought us hither 

Reveals no whence, and hints no whither." 
\ 

It is difficult to see how one who could write such 
lines could believe such sentiment. His own intellect 
refutes the thought of his cheerless rhyme. 

Religious Agnosticism is not a new form of unbelief. 
It is as old as the philosophy of the Greeks, to whom 
the Gospel was foolishness, and to many of whom vir- 
tue and morality were little more. It has been brought 
forward in our time and transformed into a new conve- 
nience, to offset new difficulties in the way of unbelief. 
It is the thin veil with which some modern philosophers, 
to whom the Gospel is also foolishness, would cover up 



HAS GOD MADE ANY REVELATION? 3 1 

the horrid deformity of absolute atheism. Its absurd- 
ity is clearly shown in the proofs that establish the 
Divine existence ; and yet it is essential to speak of it 
separately, because not a few who accept the heresy 
are quite unwilling to be classed with the avow r ed athe- 
ist, though we cannot but feel that he is the more con- 
sistent of the two. 

This unreasonable theory intrudes upon the entire 
field of religious faith and hope, as a plague forces its 
way through a city, and leaves only darkness and deso- 
lation behind. The question has vital practical rela- 
tions. It involves the best inspiration and purpose of 
life, and hence it is of most thrilling interest. It re- 
quires only a practical test to show its absurdity. Like 
all forms of infidelity, it destroys what we have, and 
furnishes no equivalent in turn. 

It is indeed difficult to see what advantage can 
result from belief of God's existence, if He has not 
made Himself known, or if we possess no faculty of 
mastering the revelation. This idea of God, not an 
unknown, but a God revealed, a God who has con- 
descended to place Himself in solemn and intimate 
relation to the race, is the great thought that inter- 
weaves w T ith the progress and faith of humanity. In 
God's own revelation we have human necessity and 
human destiny interpreted. "If in studying the phi- 
losophy of history," says Didon, "we wish to know 
all about a nation or a race, its development and cul- 
ture, there is one problem to be solved : What idea 
of God was prevalent in that nation or that race ? — and 



32 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

in accordance with such idea you shall find the pro- 
gress, the- character, and the civilization of the people." 
Of course it is not meant that we can know all about 
God. The finite can no more grasp the Infinite than 
a drop of water can hold the ocean, or a single ray of 
light can contain the sun. 

It is reasonable to suppose that a God who is great 
enough to make a revelation would contemplate man's 
supreme possibilities in it, and that much of it would 
baffle his infant faculties, and challenge the investiga- 
tion of his riper manhood. It doth not yet appear what 
we shall be. Now we know in part. The question is 
not, Can we read and comprehend all the revelation ? 
but has a revelation been made, and are we capable, 
with such help as our own reasoning faculties furnish, 
and as God is pleased to add through the method of 
His revelation, to interpret what He has revealed to 
such extent as to meet the growing wants of the soul, 
and to give to our present life and future destiny a 
purpose and glory worthy of us, and of Him who 
made us what we are ? This we hold to be a fair and 
reasonable inference, both from the character of God 
and from the nature of man. We can only conceive 
of God as a perfect being. He is not only the source 
but the illustration of the moral forces of the universe. 
It is not only the sublime function, but the necessity 
of an absolutely perfect being, that He make Himself 
known. Perfection is benevolent, and benevolence 
never rests until it is revealed. God is love — manifested 
love. Think of God saying — " My sun may shine, but 



HAS GOD MADE ANY REVELATION? 33 

I will not ; the birds I have made and fed may sing 
for the comfort and cheer of man, but he shall never 
hear my voice." If there be a God of love and holi- 
ness — for a God all power would be a monster to 
be dreaded — then, surely, He must desire that man 
should become like Him; but there is no possibility of 
recovery to His image if He has not revealed Him- 
self, or if we have no endowment equal to any inter- 
pretation of the revelation. While God's revelation 
certainly baffles man, and impresses him with his own 
limitation, it is still the function of man's faculties to 
apprehend and employ the revelation which purposely 
defines to him his limitation, and at the same time 
furnishes him the very impulse to a larger growth, by 
which he is able constantly to diminish his lack of 
knowledge. Revelation has the two-fold function of 
making God known, and of providing man with an 
inspiration and method of approaching and of be- 
coming like Him. Without this we fall back into 
hopeless mystery and are left to merciless fate. If 
this function of revelation be correct its necessity is 
proven. The revelation of God is essential to His 
being and purpose of good for us. We need to have 
it as much as He needs to make it. God's name and 
character and sovereign will must be proclaimed by 
numerous voices to the ends of the earth. For the 
best life and hope of the race, for His own glory, sun 
and system, mountain and sea, man and angel, must 
tell of Him; and as though He were alone, He must 
utter Himself in the still, small voice, and otherwise 



34 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

as it may please Him. His revelation is but the 
proclamation of every best element in manhood, in 
society, and in the nations. It is the Gospel for the 
world, more necessary than the light and more beau- 
tiful. 

Where God is not known, virtue is at a discount and 
vice commands a premium. We may go a step farther, 
and say that virtue and morality in any community 
will be found to exist in proportion to the reverence 
of the people, not for some God, but for the one living 
and true God. 

To the Christian, the Unknowable of the Agnostic is 
no God at all ; he fails to satisfy any want of the soul, 
while the thought degrades it. 

The moment we admit the Divine existence, and 
then deny that He can or has revealed Himself, we 
strike at His character and at the great functions of 
His being. 

In short, to deny His purpose to reveal Himself, is to 
deny Him. The philosophy of the Unknowable is the 
broad way to atheism. If God has not revealed Him- 
self, or if I may not know Him, then He is not my 
Creator. He is not my Father, above all He is not 
my Redeemer, and that blessed thought of personality 
which brings Him so near, and which " is the vital and 
everlasting foundation of a similar personality in the 
souls which He creates," has faded into darkness, and 
we are left to the taunt of the mocker. Then too, the 
sublime and comforting doctrine of an all-wise and 
controlling providence is gone, and we are left to the 



HAS GOD MADE ANY REVELATION? 35 

pathetic and despairing verdict of Holyoake when he 
says — " Science has shown us that we are under the 
dominion of general laws, and that there is no special 
providence. Nature acts with fearful uniformity; stern 
as fate, absolute as tyranny, merciless as death, too 
vast to praise, too inexplicable to worship, too inexor- 
able to propitiate, it has no ear for prayer, no heart for 
sympathy, no arm to save." 

The language is eloquent, but the doctrine is horrid, 
revolting; if it were true, he would be wisest who 
would temper his will as steel, and harden his heart as 
stone. 

Is not this the certain tendency of this God-dishonor- 
ing philosophy? Does it not belittle and degrade 
man, as certainly as it reproaches God ? 

If God has not revealed Himself, if we have no 
power to know that revelation, then, indeed, is the 
human mind so limited as to be no reflection of God, 
and the heart, though capable of immense unbelief, is 
not susceptible of any divine illumination, and such 
faculties as faith and love and holiness have no inter- 
preting power, if they exist at all. In such a case, the 
soul has no divine origin, and its distinction is not the 
breath that inspires it, but the chains that bind it; its 
hope has gone out, of joy it has none, and like a royal 
bird clipped of its wings it lies down in the dust to 
which it has been smitten, to put on its sullied shroud 
and die. "It is here," says Dr. Storrs, "that the ag- 
nostic scheme — ignoring God or treating Him as the 
eternal Why? to which no man has replied; the infin- 



36 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

ite Enigma which no sphinx has solved — deals its 
deadliest blow, not more at revealed religion, than at 
human liberty and civilization." This, as other forms 
of infidelity, must be tested by its practical influence 
on mankind. If, as we have seen, there is nothing en- 
nobling in it — if it is without help, without hope, with- 
out even virtue — we are forced to conclude that it is of 
the earth earthy. On the other hand, who ever knew 
a man to hold to the Christian view of God's person- 
ality and dominion, to look upon His glory as it ap- 
pears in the face of Jesus Christ, without having his 
whole intellectual nature ennobled? With less pride 
than ever before, he has come to a loftier,, truer concep- 
tion of his origin and of his possibilities in the pur- 
pose of God. He no longer looks at the surface of 
things, but penetrates to their heart; some great gen- 
erous arm reaches out of the heavens to swing a lamp 
on his path and he walks in its light, and in ways not 
less real, and more comforting, he hears the voice 
of his Father — God, as certainly as Adam heard it 
when walking in the garden in the cool of the day. 
This experience may be treated with contempt, but it 
cannot be questioned, for it is identical w T ith the holiest 
thought, clearest convictions, and noblest impulses of 
man's soul. To surrender it for Agnosticism would 
be giving up light for darkness, the torch of hope for 
hopeless despair. Religious Agnosticism, with no 
little of the pride of reason, is a compound of ignor- 
nance, prejudice and unbelief, the last w r ord being the 
inclusive one. How blind it is! How it feigns to 



HAS GOD MADE ANY REVELATION? 37 

grope! It is the Christian revelation that announces 
its character. Over against it, what excellence of 
knowledge responds to the faculty of faith ! To this 
man, God is no distant sublimity, no bewildering 
dream, no creation of poetry, no cold, indifferent mys- 
tery of human philosophy, but He is the God that made 
the world and all things therein, giving to all life and 
breath and all things, whom we are exhorted to seek and 
find ; who is nigh to every one of us ; in whom we live, 
and move, and have our being ; whose offspring we are. 

The great difficulty in the way of the Agnostic is 
lack of the spiritual faculty : what he denies is spirit- 
ually discerned. To his unbelief no voice answers 
from the holy of holies in the temple of the universe, 
and he therefore concludes there is no voice. On the 
other hand, man at his best, man unshackled, his soul 
illumined and responsive to all that is noble and pure, 
knows God and calls Him his Father. The pure in 
heart see Him. He is revealed in the face of Jesus 
Christ. 

From the fact of revelation let us turn now to the 
method. If God has revealed Himself, through what 
means or agency has He made known His character 
and will to us ? It is reasonable to suppose that if 
God has condescended to reveal Himself, the rev- 
elation would be of such a character as to appeal to 
us, though in its infinite scope we should not be able to 
master it. It is enough that it responds to our facul- 
ties, and that the knowledge that is possible to us is 
always adequate to present necessity. It argues noth- 



38 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

ing against God's revelation in any of its forms, that it 
constantly baffles us; this fact is in its favor rather, for 
the mystery of revelation is alike an intimation of 
man's possibilities, and of its Divine Source. The 
scholar often writes and speaks in language his pupil 
cannot understand, but does not this very fact imply 
that he has and will descend to his feeblest compre- 
hension ? To the little child there are profound mys- 
teries in the spelling-book, and it is to his advantage 
that it is so. 

So, God's revelation in the nature of the case must 
ever be above us, both to maintain its supreme origin 
and to keep the great faculties of the soul under chal- 
lenge. In any form of God's revelation, no matter 
what our attainments, though they should transcend 
the powers of the archangel, we should never want for 
a stirring inspiration to take another step onward. 
Revelation contemplates man's never-ending growth. 
Its infinity is its excellence and glory. It is a wonder- 
ful testimony to God's abounding love and goodness, 
that in all of His methods of discovering Himself to us, 
there is something for the child as well as for the sage, 
something for the illiterate toiler no less than for the 
renowned scholar. He that runneth may read, and he 
that soars with strong brave wing need not be hindered 
in his flight. In short, God has not only revealed 
Himself, but He has contemplated every want and 
every grade of human capacity in His revelation. 

Right here we come upon one of God's methods of 
revelation. He speaks distinctly in the religious in- 



HAS GOD MADE ANY REVELATION? 39 

stincts of man's nature. God wrote His law upon the 
human heart before it was transcribed upon two tables 
of stone. Man's own conscious aspiring soul is the 
answer to God's personality. When the deepest, 
holiest yearnings of man's nature go out to God, it is 
not that God may speak to him, but that He has 
already done so. Without this no soul could ever say 
with the Psalmist, / meditate npo7i Him in the night 
watches. My meditation of Him shall be sweet. What 
means it when a soul looks up in filial affection and 
trust to say — Our Father which art in heaven ? Is it 
not God's own response to the soul's best longings that 
prompts so hallowed a recognition ? That man at his 
best does want and must have God, is substantial evi- 
dence that He has made Himself known. Who that 
has any faith in God, any religious sense and hope, has 
not found in this sentiment of Descartes, the correct 
expression of his own experience, — " I feel that I am 
an imperfect and changeable thing, aspiring incessantly 
toward that which is perfect and unchangeable." De- 
spite even the unbelief of men, when God utters His 
voice to the soul, faint gleams of faith struggle up 
through the debris of worldliness, the ashes of victori- 
ous passion, and the black gloom of skepticism, and 
tremblingly feels after God. The poet voices well the 
impressive cry of the soul at such a time, in these 
lines : 

" Oh give me back a world of life ; 
Something to love and trust, 
Something to quench my inward strife, 
And lift me from the dust. 



40 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

" I cannot live with nature dead, 
'Mid laws and causes blind, 
Powerless on earth or overhead, 
To trace all guiding Mind. 

" Better the instinct of the brute 
That feels its God afar, 
Than reason to His praises mute, 
Talking with every star." 

When love and obedience follow, we have in this the 
devout pupil sitting at the feet of God, and in any 
event the evidence that He has spoken to the con- 
scious soul. 

But having touched upon this in the preceding 
chapter, let us turn now to God's revelation in nature. 
To some, the thought that God has revealed Himself 
in nature is a fancy long since exploded. The difficulty 
is not that no revelation has been made, and that it is 
not full of wonder and instruction, but that many have 
no faculty for reading it. Their lack is not want of 
learning, else they might be excused, but want of faith. 
Nature, properly interpreted, undoubtedly is the revel- 
ation of marvelous power, wisdom and goodness, and 
when we note its equally wonderful order and adapta- 
tion, we are forced to believe that it is the exhibition 
of superlative means to a corresponding end. These 
attributes do not first centre in nature, but in God, the 
Author of nature. The world was made to reveal 
God. The heavens declare the glory of God, and the 
firmament showeth His handy -work. Day unto day ut- 
ter eth speech, and flight unto night shew eth knozvledge. 
There is no speech nor language, where their voice is not 



HAS GOD MADE ANY REVELATION? 4 1 

heard. Their line is gone out through all the earth, and 
their words to the end of the world. God has His way 
in the sea. He utters his voice in the thunder. Fire and 
hail ; snow and vapour ; stormy wi?id fulfill His word. 
It is He that sitteth upon the circle of the earth, and the 
inhabitants thereof are as grasshoppers ; that stretcheth 
out the heavens as a curtain, and spreadeth them out as 
a tent to dwell in. On the one hand we must reject 
the theory of the Pantheist, who sees in everything a 
god, thereby destroying His personality and His father- 
hood; and on the other hand we must put away as 
decidedly the theory of the naturalist or rationalist, 
who, while distinguishing God from His works, ban- 
ishes Him to some remote solitude, so rendering Him 
unknowable and unavailable. God is universal in 
nature. What He has made He preserves and con- 
trols. He is over all, God blessed forevermore. Nature 
is subject to law, but it is the hand of God that covers 
the law, and right-mindedness and faith always see the 
hand first. The manifest force is God rather than law. 
God is revealed in nature. We believe with the poet 
that He— 

" Flings from the sun direct the naming day : 
Feeds every creature; hurls the tempest forth. 
And as on earth this grateful change revolves, 
With transport touches all the springs of life." 

When men come to themselves, when the best ele- 
ments in manhood dominate, when they begin to move 
toward Him who made them, — these thoughts become 
clear, pleasing and potent. 



42 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

It is not without significance that a great mind like 
Newton, when he had skirted the edges of immensity, 
and gazed entranced across the infinite expanse, was 
compelled to uncover and adore that God who has 
written His name so distinctly around the circling 
worlds that crowd immeasurable space. While not 
trusting it w T holly, nor counting it adequate, but loving 
it more because he has a better and more personal 
Word, the devout soul will always see in . nature the 
handw T riting of God, and own himself ennobled by and 
responsible for the revelation. Some one has said with 
as much truth as beauty, " This we may discern as- 
suredly; this every true light of science, every merci- 
fully granted power, every wisely restricted thought, 
teach us more clearly day by day, that in the heavens 
above and in the earth beneath, there is one continual 
and omnipotent presence of help and peace for all men 
who know that they live and remember that they die." 
That presence is God. 

To abandon faith in such a presence in all the world 
about us, speaking tenderly and helpfully to us as sea- 
sons roll, and the mercies of each night and morning 
are renewed, is to dw r arf the soul, and to strike all en- 
nobling hope from destiny. 

But beyond this there is still a higher and more dis- 
tinct revelation. It is the revelation of the Gospel and 
of the Christ of the Gospel. If God can and is re- 
solved to reveal Himself, He may choose His own 
methods. That they confound us is not to be won- 
dered at. How he shall be pleased to manifest Him- 



HAS GOD MADE ANY REVELATION? 43 

self is not a matter of our dictation, and if we are reve- 
rent will never be a subject of adverse criticism. In 
this form of revelation we pass from Theism to Chris- 
tianity. Nature has its place, but after all, it is its 
limitation that baffles man, and renders it alone insuf- 
ficient. The deepest wants of our nature call for a 
more distinct and personal revelation of God. If God 
is what we have found Him to be in nature, wise and 
powerful and good, it is entirely reasonable to suppose 
that He would complete the work, and thus open a 
plain and free way of access to Himself. God has 
supplemented the Book of Nature with the Holy 
Scriptures. In the latter the veil is removed, and we 
not only behold His glory as in Nature, but we hear 
His voice in a message of grace and truth. Added to 
wisdom and power, we now have love and mercy. 
This is most desirable, most satisfactory. The answer 
to the Agnostic's assertion that we cannot comprehend 
any revelation God might be pleased to make, is the 
unanswerable testimony of so many that they know 
whom they believe. The creed of the Agnostic is not a 
reasonable protest against a supernatural revelation, 
" but the confession of the spiritual numbness of 
humanity." It is God's own inspired Book that most 
clearly expounds and confounds the theory of the Ag- 
nostic. His creed is the wild barren bloom of his own 
spiritual illiteracy. His doctrine is no argument against 
the possibility and fact of a supernatural revelation, but 
it is a forcible illustration of the inability of the natural 
man to read and comprehend it. The theory of the 



44 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

rationalist that such a direct Revelation from God is 
not necessary, because of the sufficiency of human 
reason and the fulness of nature, is equally absurd. 

Lord Herbert of Cherbury, the first and purest of 
modern deists, contended for this view, and strange as 
it may seem, boldly contradicted his theory in the very 
method he adopted. 

After having been enlightened by the inspired Reve- 
lation, he devoted the knowledge thus gained to the 
writing of a book, whose object was to disprove its 
necessity. When finished, he was perplexed as to the 
propriety of publishing it. His own words explain 
how the question was determined. Retiring to his 
chamber one summer day, his window open to the 
south, the sun shining bright in the heavens, he says : 
" I took my book in my hand, and devoutly kneeling 
said these words ; ' O thou eternal God, author of the 
light which now shines upon me, and giver of all in- 
ward illumination, I beseech Thee of Thy infinite good- 
ness, to pardon a greater request than a sinner ought 
to make. I am not satisfied enough whether I shall 
publish this book. If it be for Thy glory, I beseech 
Thee give me some sure sign from heaven ; if not, I 
shall suppress it.' I had no sooner spoken these words 
but a loud and gentle voice came from the heavens, 
which did so comfort and cheer me, that I took my 
petition as granted and that I had the sign I de- 
manded." This is remarkable ! An intelligent man 
confessing the need of a supernatural revelation to 
make clear to him that he should publish a book 



HAS GOD MADE ANY REVELATION ? 45 

whose sole object was to prove that no such revelation 
is necessary. Who can comprehend the inventions, 
who penetrate the darkness, who fathom the unreason- 
ableness of unbelief? Surely we need no more forcible 
illustration of the limitation of human reason, unen- 
lightened by the Spirit of God, and of the necessity of 
that Revelation which is at once the product and the 
shrine of the Holy Ghost. 

Nature is but the outer court of God's great temple; 
the Scriptures open wide the gates, and bid us enter. 
Nature, in the lilies that bloom, and in the birds that 
sing, teaches us the tenderness of a Father's care : but 
the inspired Word tells us how He loves men, and 
what He has done to save them. Take Nature with 
the Word, and it greets the devout soul with a choral 
of voices speaking Jehovah's praise ; take it alone, and 
you have only a lustrous grave, a prison covered with 
shadows and fretted with sorrows. Nature has riches 
untold, beauties undescribed, forces unmastered, mys- 
teries unfathomed ; her stairway to the Creator's throne 
is jewelled with stars and girt with coursing worlds. 
But not even from her illumined dome or noblest min- 
istry, comes the faintest whisper of pardon for guilt and 
mercy for sinners. The outer court, however splendid, 
is not enough : it offers no shelter from the storm, and 
lifts no interceding palm between our souls and a holy 
God, nor do we find what we need and want until, 
through grace, we are ushered into the presence cham- 
ber of the Redeeming King. Somehow, it is the testi- 
mony of unanswerable experience, of the soul under the 



46 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

bright light of heaven, that the human heart is never so 
noble, never so joyous, never so useful, never so holy, 
as when it beholds God in the face of Jesus Christ. 

The sublime complemental fact is wanting until we 
have this. This is final. In Christ God's revelation 
to man on earth is complete. Without this we must 
fail of His purpose respecting ourselves. We are not 
what we may be, not what God wants us to be, until 
we can look upon Him out of His welcomed self in 
us. It can only be through Christ. No man hath 
seen God at any time ; the only begotten Son which is 
in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him. No 
man knoweth the Son but the Father, neither knoweth 
any man the Father save the Son, and he to whomsoever 
the Son will reveal Him. The incarnation was not a 
blinding display of God's majesty for His own plea- 
sure, it was not a proud exhibition of His power, it 
was a supreme necessity, having a moral end as sub- 
lime as it is vast — an end that involves all the world's 
best progress and hope. It declares that God must 
be known, and that more than in sun and star, He has 
spoken in Jesus Christ His Son. In all that goes be- 
fore of revelation we have but parts of His ways, and 
these parts can only be read aright, and will only be 
appropriated wisely, as they are seen in the effulgence 
of Him who is the life and li^ht of men. Manifestly 
the fulness of divine revelation is not attained in na- 
ture, but in Him in whom dwelt all the fulness of the 
Godhead bodily, and who without pretense or vanity 
could face the incredulous, and say : He that hath seen 



HAS GOD MADE ANY REVELATION? 47 

me hath seen the Father. The best elements of divin- 
ity do not centre and achieve in power, in intelligence, 
in design, not even in mere goodness. God is love, and 
until this is made known, not only as a fact, but also as 
a saving Gospel, revelation is not complete. I look 
into nature, and if I catch a glimpse of goodness it is 
more of conjecture than a revelation, for nature is in- 
exorable — its tramp is often that of a merciless con- 
queror. In the roar of the sea, in the voice of the 
thunder, in the deep mutterings of the tempest, I see 
the going of almightiness, but this does not disclose 
character; there is no God in this suited to the great 
needs and best aspirations of my nature; I hear no 
Father's voice in these; there is majesty and might over- 
whelming, but I must have a God whose chief charac- 
teristic is other than cold tearless strength. I could 
only fear such a God, but could not love or trust Him. 
My heart aches, sorrow folds its dripping wings upon 
me, I am often lonely, the world seems empty, decep- 
tive and heartless ; I am without a companion, without 
one to bind up my heart's sores, or to give me a balm 
for my pains. Still more, I am guilty; I dare not turn 
in the direction of absolute holiness, lest the unsullied 
blaze consume me ; indeed with a God only known in 
His majesty and power there is nothing to break my 
heart into penitence, nor to induce me to rise and 
haste to paternal and forgiving embrace. Ah, 
blessed fact ! Unutterable vision of God ! Sublime 
disclosure of your omnipotent loving Father and 
mine ! Jesus stands between us and such a cheer- 



48 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

less fate. What of it, if His benignant face was 
marred more than any man's ? — it was only that on so 
dark a back-ground he might better throw off the hal- 
lowed glow of infinite love, and help me to sound the 
crystal depths of God's compassion. I know now that 
God is no selfish Jove : He has a heart, He is not inac- 
cessible to human need nor to human approach, He is 
susceptible to moral impression, my penitence touches 
Him, and to hear my prayers He will pass the angels 
by. I have offended Him, grieved His heart, but I am 
His child, and that He may not fright me, but amply 
respond to my necessity, He will veil His insufferable 
glory in a human body and approach me in a gentle 
winning love. God in Christ, manifesting His love, 
blushing sin into contrition by His amazing compas- 
sion, blending holiness with pity that He may disclose 
His character and will, that He may make me wise unto 
salvation, this is the supreme purpose and glory of the 
incarnation. In all the multitude of human devices 
and theories, what conception of God so sublime and 
so manifestly fitted to man's nature and needs as this ? 
Beyond this God will not go, and there is no need He 
should. His revelation in Christ -meets the whole 
case. Supply the condition of simple faith, and all hin- 
drance to the ultimate perfection of humanity is re- 
moved. We shall be like Him. It is enough. We 
can only bow our souls in grateful adoration before 
the infinite wonder, and exclaim — Great is the mystery 
of godliness : God was manifest in the flesh, justified in 
the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles 9 
believed on in the world, received up into glory. 



HAS GOD MADE ANY REVELATION? 49 

Blessed the man who in the aisles of the forests, by 
the sounding sea, or gazing into the starry depths, 
can hold communion with God, but thrice blessed he, 
whose heart has been illumined with the light of the 
knowledge of the glory of God in the face of jFesus 
Christ. 

Next to the fact that God has really revealed Him- 
self in the manner indicated, the method of discern- 
ment is important. Here is the main difficulty with 
the unbeliever. He has no faculty of discernment. As 
the gifted author of " Natural Law In the Spiritual 
World " tells us — " The nescience of the Agnostic 
philosophy is the proof from experience that to be 
carnally minded is Death. * * It brings no solace 
to the unspiritual man to be told he is mistaken. To 
say he is self-deceived is neither to compliment him nor 
Christianity. He builds in all sincerity who raises his 
altar to the Unknown God. He does not know God. 
With all his marvellous and complex correspondences, 
he is still one correspondence short" He lacks the 
spiritual faculty, and this he can only secure by faith 
in God, not simply as He is revealed in nature — the 
man of natural religion has this — but as He is revealed 
in grace, in Christ. To know God only in nature, is 
not enough to enable the soul to drink in His life. To 
this, spiritual enlightenment, repentance toward God, 
and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, are necessary. This 
is life eternal, to know Thee, the true God, and {fesus 
Christ whom Thou hast sent. In this view, how clear 
the Divine law of interpretation. The Spirit searcheth 
3 



5<D VITAL QUESTIONS. 

all things , yea the deep things of God. For what man 
knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man 
which is in him ? even so the things of God, knoweth no 
man, but the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not 
the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God ; 
that we might know the things that are freely given to 
us of God. * * But the natural man receiveth not 
the things of the Spirit of God ; for they are foolishness 
unto him : neither can he know them, because they are 
spiritually discerned. 

Surely when Nature has done all it can do for us, 
the great problem of the universe remains unsolved. 
We yet need that the Light of the world come to us 
with healing in His beams. With the light of God's 
Spirit shining over against His life and Word, what 
gate will not open to the touch of faith? Nature and 
Science both confirm this law of higher discernment. 
How many people live in the world who have never 
seen the stars, and to whom the sweet flowers are no- 
thing more than the dust of the highway! They are 
discerned by faculties they do not possess. They mani- 
fest themselves to souls broader and better in vision. 
God has not only made Himself known, but He fur- 
nishes the endowment by which the revelation may be 
mastered. He uses the faculties we have, or rather 
He allows us to use them; but they are only equal to 
the case when illumined by His own light. In thy 
light shall we see light. For God, who commanded the 
light to shine out of darkness, hath shined into our hearts 
to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God 



HAS GOD MADE ANY REVELATION ? 5 I 

in the face of Jesus Christ. Men go about attempting 
to find God and to discover His will, after every method 
but the right method, and they fail. It has always 
been true, always will be true, that the world by its own 
wisdom can never know God. He furnishes the light 
for that sublimest and noblest of all visions. Closing 
the eyes of the soul to this true Light reveals the secret 
of the unbelief of men and of their manifest distaste for 
all religious services and engagements. They are with- 
out the spiritual faculty. Having eyes they see not, 
having ears they hear not, though God in wondrous 
love has unveiled His glory and out of the open heavens 
has called to men, saying as He points to Him through 
whom He has spoken — This is my beloved Son, hear ye 
Him. Many are the indisputable witnesses confirming 
the truth that who comes to Him humbly, believingly, 
shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, and with His 
presence the seeker after truth in the Divine Word 
will find before him an open door. The Spirit of God 
is the interpreter of Scripture, the revealer of Jesus 
Christ to the human soul. The Comforter ; which is the 
Holy Ghost, whom the Father will send in my name, He 
shall teach yon all things, and bring all things to your 
remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you. 

The Holy Spirit, like the Son of God, is the gift of 
God. He is pleased to dwell in such as be of a con- 
trite heart. He can be had for the asking. 

If ye then, being evil y know how to give good gifts 
unto your children ; how much more shall your Heav- 
enly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask Him ? 



CHAPTER III. 

CAN WE DISPENSE WITH GOD? 

WHAT has already been said might suffice to an- 
swer this startling question, but for the fact that 
avowed atheism is not so much the evil of our time 
as that wide-spread practical disbelief of God, which 
so neutralizes all the beneficial effects of mere theism. 
Along with the evidence establishing the being of 
God, and the kindred truth that He has revealed Him- 
self, it is a need of our time that men be reminded 
that they personally need God every day and every- 
where. The evil results of absolute and of practical 
atheism need to be placed side by side, that men may 
see that in all that is vital to the individual, the one is 
just as fatal as the other. The age is practical, and it is 
a favorable omen that men to-day are more disposed 
than formerly to test all systems that challenge their 
faith, not by their pretense, but by the practical advan- 
tages they can furnish. With this method of test our 
question must be speedily settled in the minds of all 
reasonable men. 

The experience of atheism in all of its forms is 
wholly against it. The dread evil has existed suffi- 
ciently long in this world, to have produced a history 
by which it may be fairly tested. Willing or unwilling, 
it cannot escape this method of measurement. Its 

(52) 



CAN WE DISPENSE WITH GOD? 53 

own fruit must furnish the one reliable verdict respect- 
ing its own character and claim upon the respect of 
men. Surely it cannot be disputed, that it is not what 
it has done for the race, but rather what it has undone, 
that gives to it its unenviable distinction. This is 
equally true of that sadly dominant practical atheism 
which marks our time. 

The theism of the intellect merely is certainly better 
than avowed atheism, but in thousands it furnishes 
license for reckless living, and a fatal indifference to all 
the lofty purposes of faith. Detach belief in and re- 
spect for God from the affections and sympathies, from 
the occupations and aims of life, and what is there to 
prevent the worst results of atheism ? They were not all 
atheists who joined in the Reign of Terror in France, 
when God was dethroned and Reason was deified. 
Some were Deists; but with no heart for the God, the 
evidence of whose existence they could not resist. 
Deists in their intellects they were atheists out and out, 
in heart and life, and the fruit of one and the other was 
alike. Many were surprised and some were grieved at 
the result of their principles. Dr. Cairns, in speaking 
of that period, says — " Atheism, and not less the bare 
theism which detaches God from human sympathies, is 
fraught with violence ; for it was under the banner of 
the one or the other, that in the four hundred and 
twenty days of Terror the guillotine destroyed four 
thousand victims. Voltaire and his associates would 
doubtless have disclaimed these atrocities, but what 
did their principles do to hinder them ? These things 



54 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

were done in the name of Reason — first, when, in No- 
vember, 1793, the so-called Goddess of Reason was 
installed in Notre Dame, and again when in June, 
1794, the feast of the Supreme Being was presided 
over by Robespierre, in the Garden of the Tuileries. ,, 
The awful results of all this shocking mockery, the 
chief end of which was the overthrow of Christianity, 
startled even the wasted moral sense of not a few who 
were engaged in it. It was absolute and practical 
Atheism joining hands, as they often do, against all 
that is holy and hopeful for mankind. In that time, 
as Cairns continues — " The Pentecost of unbelief had 
come, and what were its creations? The failure is de- 
cisive in the history of the world; for there never can 
be a better moment to inaugurate a new creed, a new 
ritual, even a new and revolutionary calendar; and if 
these were all dead-born, or born to die, does not 
Deism, as a final world-worship, resign the field?" 
The secularism of our time is a similar effort. It is a 
religion, if it may be dignified by such a title, in 
which Reason is made supreme, from which absolute 
Atheism is not prohibited, and in which practical 
Atheism is illustrated. Nor is this modern effort new. 
It is a kind of reaction from the ominous chill that 
follows unbelief, often in the minds of those who have 
given it impulse and character. After the Reign of 
Terror, M. Lepaux, a member of the Directory, inau- 
gurated this very movement which has unfurled its 
pretentious banner among us to-day. It was a system 
founded on the idealism of Rousseau, and called after 



CAN WE DISPENSE WITH GOD? 55 

the compassionate title of Theophilanthropy. Yet 
nothing could have been more dishonoring to God, or 
more boldly illustrative of the selfishness of man. 
Christ, prayer, and every sign of the supernatural, were 
prohibited. The author was not flattered with his 
success. When on one occasion he had read a paper 
on the subject before the institute, he requested an 
opinion from Tallyrand. " I have but one observation 
to make," said the critic; u in order to found his reli- 
gion, Jesus Christ was crucified and raised again : you 
ought to attempt as much." A man must be more 
than a Deist to die for his faith. A religion, not sim- 
ply without a God, but without a God that regenerates 
the heart and fills it with all holy affections toward 
Him and for mankind, is of the earth earthy. Such a 
religion is at most but the mask of respectability 
thrown over the hideous form of atheism. The mo- 
ment God is abandoned the moral sense is violated, 
every best impulse of man's nature is set back. 

If there is one here and there who denies the being 
of God, and yet retains virtue and respectability, it is 
not because of his atheism, but in defiance of it. As 
well expect to find bread in the stones of the street as 
ennobling virtue in atheism. Unconsciously it may 
be, and without any capacity to admit it we are sure; 
still, most certainly, the external rectitude of unbeliev- 
ing men is owing to the influences by which they are 
surrounded — to that all pervasive conviction that there 
is a God in heaven, which happily imposes a more 
wholesome and powerful restraint upon communities 



56 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

and individuals than we are disposed to think. We 
cannot judge of the results of atheism by these few- 
isolated cases. We may see and know it best where 
it has proclaimed itself as a system for man's accept- 
ance, and where it has systematically wrought out its 
legitimate results. One nation alone has the unen- 
viable fame of having given it a trial. It shook it as 
with the throes of an earthquake, and out of the roar 
of the desolating storm the mournful cry went up for 
God's return. That page of history is written in the 
ink of forfeited virtue, tinged with human blood. Time 
will never furnish ages enough to blot that awful crime 
from the memory of France. " No civilized people 
ever gave so bloody and foul a chapter to history." 
Let God be violently expelled from any community, 
city, or nation, and all protest against, and all protec- 
tion from the infamy and ruin of the French Revolu- 
tion will be removed. In such a case the thought of a 
people becomes corrupt, and every rein is flung loose 
on the neck of passion. All moral conditions become 
perverted, and faculties that were created to be the 
shrine of purity, and the means of blessing to the 
world become the surging fountains of iniquitous doc- 
trine and unrestrained lust. The unbelieving authors 
of the time to which I have referred debauched the 
virtue of the nation. The philosophy of Atheism was 
a very cess-pool bubbling up with unmentionable cor- 
ruption. Prof Cairns says, " The loose teaching in 
regard to marriage, and looser practice, bore fruit in 
relentless cruelty ; and the alliance * * * as it 



CAN WE DISPENSE WITH GOD? 57 

had been before set forth by Milton, was blazoned in let- 
ters of fire — * Lust hard by Hate.' The defence of sui- 
cide also made life cheap, not only in the case of those 
who so numerously acted on it, but of society at large." 
Alike dreadful was the teaching of Helvetius, who 
in his work on " Mind," with pretense of enhancing 
the public good, outrages virtue by blushlessly appeal- 
ing to " government to promote luxury, and through 
luxury public good, by abolishing all those laws that 
cherish a false modesty and restrain libertinage." This 
is the unhallowed overture of the age of reason ; this 
is getting on without God. Even the skeptic Rousseau 
was compelled to write this awful verdict against 
atheism : " Its principles do not kill men, but they 
hinder them from being born, in destroying the man- 
ners which multiply them, in detaching them from 
their species, in reducing all their affections to a secret 
egoism as fatal to population as to virtue." Atheism 
unrestrained is not only a blow at God, it is as well 
the extinction of humanity. Abandon God, and the 
race becomes the most dreadful calamity in the uni- 
verse. We must enthrone this great idea of God, if 
we are ourselves to be. There is not a noble possibil- 
ity of our human life that is not absolutely dependent 
upon the reverent recognition of the great thought of 
God. Abandon God, and every step man takes car- 
ries him to the edge of a precipice, and the pit below 
is bottomless. Oh, the wierd desolation of the very 
thought! Who can sound the dark depths of the dis- 
mal experience ? 
3* 



58 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

Were it possible to banish those who will have no 
God, or who will have it that there is no God to have, 
from the communities that own His righteous will to 
those where His name is unmentioned save in blasphe- 
mous scorn, I cannot but think the frightful experience 
would stir a whirlwind, in whose deafening roar they 
would listen tremblingly for the voice they had so 
wickedly attempted to hush within them. But this 
test cannot be made, for it has been demonstrated that 
no community can ever endure long without God. Let 
the proclamation go forth that the Supreme One who 
loves righteousness and hates iniquity no longer sits 
on the throne of the universe, and personal responsibil- 
ity is gone, law becomes a toy in the soiled grasp of 
unbridled passion, society is without any safeguard, an 
unspeakable sadness would brood over the world, and 
the sum of benediction would be death. We are 
baffled in attempting to conceive the extent of damage 
which must result to the morals, to the prosperity, to 
the happiness, and to the hope of mankind, should a 
single nation on this earth drop into the horror of 
atheism. If there be no God, then judgment upon 
and justice for the wrongs of centuries must be given 
up; then there is no mother-heart brooding over us to 
whom we can tell our sorrows ; the hope of a cloudless 
morning and a graveless world, is the most taunting 
mockery of human speech; the weak must go down 
under the heel of the strong ; human culture is a waste 
of time ; all sweet poetry is a lie ; the best songs of the 
heart are the piteous notes of its own bitter bondage; 



CAN WE DISPENSE WITH GOD? 59 

the lustrous heavens, beyond whose blaze of stars faith 
has loved to fix the glowing gates of a morning open- 
ing on eternal day, is but the splendid dome of a vast 
prison ; and as for the deep yearnings and struggles 
and hopes of our souls after something better, what are 
these but the ''refinement of cruelty, and the very 
torture of hell ?" Dispense with God ! It were better 
that that nation should be blotted out. Dispense with 
God ! It were better for that man if he had never 
been born. Our gratitude is challenged, our devoutest 
worship is warranted, our unfaltering faith is demanded, 
in the fact that God has so made the world, established 
such laws of human progress in the nations, and so 
constructed human nature, that He never has been, 
and never can be, without a witness. The verdict of 
the ages past and of the ages to come will be the same. 
The need of God is perpetual and absolute. 

From the evil results of avowed atheism, let us turn 
now to that practical atheism which meets us on every 
hand. If the experience of the one furnishes us no 
proof that we can dispense with God, what saith the 
other? With many who sometimes boast their inde- 
pendence of His loving interposition, there is never- 
theless an abiding conviction that God is. They would 
shrink from the abandonment of the thought of God 
as the Creator of all things, and yet they practically 
exclude Him from heart and life. God is not in all 
their thoughts, and yet they would stoutly resent the 
charge of any likeness to those who have dared to deny 
His being. The voluntary exclusion of God from the 



60 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

faith and life-purpose of men is one of the most pain- 
ful and damaging fruits of modern unbelief. It is to be 
seen everywhere, and is alike an illustration and test 
of the materialism and worldliness of the time. Touch 
what sphere we please, we cannot but be impressed 
with the disposition of men to get on without God. 
It is manifest in the commercial, in the social, in the 
political, and in the literary world, nor is the religious 
kingdom at all times free from it. If, indeed, less dar- 
ing, it is not less forward than atheism outright, and 
has not hesitated to intrude upon the highest sanctities. 
Men seem to be content with a general assent to the 
great truth of a Supreme First Cause ; but as to His 
having anything to do with their affairs, as to His hav- 
ing any claim upon their time, their devotion and life, 
they refuse consent to such a gospel. It is only the 
devout soul, only the soul that desires to know and to 
do the will of the Infinite Father, that looks up and sings 
with humble dependence and gladness of trust, — 

"When all Thy mercies, O my God, 

My rising soul surveys, 
Transported with the view, I'm lost 

In wonder, love, and praise." 

There is really no more defense for this practical athe- 
ism than for theoretic denial, for the distrust and dis- 
respect of God in such a case is little if any better 
than his unmanly verdict who blots out the Holy Name 
altogether. Indeed, the latter is the more consistent 
of the two. The avowed atheist has nothing to do with 
God, because he does not believe that He is: the prac- 



CAN WE DISPENSE WITH GOD? 6 1 

tical atheist believes that He is, and refuses to trust 
Him. In each instance the attitude is a reproach upon 
God, and a test and illustration of character. As a 
rule it is true, that just as conscience and morals go 
down, and worldliness and unbelief gain the mastery, 
in like proportion will the thought of God drop out of 
mind, and the law of God drop out of life. This fact is 
significant, and bears with force upon the truth that a 
reverent belief in God is essential to all proper charac- 
ter and life. God can easily get on without us. He 
dwells in great infinities ; in Himself there is an illimi- 
tableness inconceivable by any grasp of ours; and 
though all men should thrust Him from them, and in 
the frightful rebound themselves dash into outer dark- 
ness, — not one of the mighty resources in Him would 
wither or waste, but in such case man's loss would 
be complete and hopeless. All we are, together with 
all our best possibilities, not only challenge but demand 
faith in God. Doubtless there are those who do not 
want God. They entertain a secret dislike of Him. 
In all their unmanly doubt they have a strange dread 
of Him, and if all reverence for Him could be blotted 
from the faith and hope of the race, they would fill the 
heavens with their chuckling glee. But what is the 
character of these unfortunate men? — what their help 
on the side of virtue, order, and truth ? It is only nec- 
essary to ask these questions to give emphasis to the 
fact that communities and homes can far easier dispense 
with these men than they can do without God. No 
man at his best has any desire to dispense with God. 



62 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

Human nature must fondle its chains as an orna- 
ment and glory in its own shame, before it can or will 
brave such a venture. That awful degradation more 
certainly proves that this barest, all blotted image of a 
man needs God, than the forlorn condition of a vagrant 
child proves that it needs a mother. Unquestionably 
the cry of a human soul when untrammeled is for 
God. We cannot judge of man's noblest aspirations 
nor of his possibilities at his worst, nor is it fair to do 
so. There are better moments in the experience of 
the worst man, when his deepest soul-longing is for 
God. That want is at once an evidence of His great- 
ness and an appeal that the want should be supplied. 
Here is an instrument covered with dust and unstrung. 
In its present state it is impossible to determine its 
purpose, to know what service it has rendered, or what 
if restrung and touched by skilled fingers it is still 
competent to do. It is not so much from man's ruin, 
as from the disparity between his real and better self 
and the degradation into which he has fallen, from his 
uneasiness and his efforts now and again to throw off 
his chains and to ascend into brighter light and freer 
air, that we may interpret his necessity and in some 
degree the extent of his possibilities. There is hope 
for a prodigal so long as his best yearnings go out to 
his father's house. The soul that is yet capable of a 
blush at the thought of God, proves that it still 
enshrines something akin to Him, and that He alone 
is the source of its rescue and possible greatness. 
What does it mean that as men sink in the moral 



CAN WE DISPENSE WITH GOD? 63 

scale they wish to abandon God, and as they rise they 
wish to know and realize His presence more than ever 
— but that in either case it is God the soul requires? 
When the prodigal has come to himself, not even the 
great black cloud of his shame can keep him from 
home. Weary of his wretched self-orphanage, yearn- 
ing for his father's house, he will arise and go. It 
only needs that the soul see its pitiable bondage to 
lead it to take refuge in God. 

Now the thought of atheism is a horror, and the 
desire to live without a friendly personal relation to 
God cannot be endured. He has found the only true 
basis and spirit of human life, and a blessed repose 
and a much-meaning revelation attends his new ex- 
perience. Keep it in mind that as men advance in the 
noble and the pure, does the desire for and apprehen- 
sion of God increase. The pure in heart see Him. 
The high faculties of. the soul can only assert them- 
selves as He fills them. He who provides bread for 
the hunger and water for the thirst of the body, Him- 
self comes to satisfy the hunger and thirst of the soul. 
Strange that men are so blind to the necessity! The 
testimony, whether on the side of faith or unbelief, is 
certainly as convincing as it is ample. When men are 
lawless and vicious, when the evil in them is master- 
ful, they say: What is the Almighty, that we should 
serve Jlim? and zu hat profit should we have if we pray 
unto Ilim ? The air they assume is almost defiant, 
and yet with these very men, the reproach is not al- 
ways because the thought of God has been entirely 



64 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

rooted out of the soul, but because it still lingers. 
They have still a dread consciousness, not only that 
God is, but that He is needed, that His claim is just, 
and that somehow and somewhere the soul that is so 
hostile to Him must sooner or later come into peaceful 
or painful contact with Him. This aspiring of the soul 
toward God, sometimes a strange and unwelcome 
voice in the vicious, and often kindling to heartv desire 
in the virtuous, is the universal, ever-present and in- 
eradicable testimonv to the truth that we cannot, dare 
not dispense with God. Between God and man there 
is a responsive pulse, and when the soul, as it were, 
instinctively cries out to Him, it as surely indicates a 
great essential want, of which He alone is the supply, 
as does the pleading wail of an infant indicate its 
mother-want. Whether heard in the importunity* of 
prayer or read as part of the inspired revelation, there 
is nothing between the lids of the Bible of which the 
soul of man is so largely alike the source and the sub- 
ject, as this word of the Psalmist, — My soul thirsteth 
for God, for the living God. It is something to stand 
above the blank, black despair of atheism and rever- 
ently uncover before the going of Jehovah in the ma- 
terial universe, but the excellence of manhood is only 
attained when faith enshrines the great thought and 
man can look up and say — God is the strength of my 
lie art and my portion forever. To accept the existence 
of God with the intellect and exclude Him from the 
heart and life, is to reject His sublimest and fullest 
revelation, and to forfeit all the best purposes and 



CAN WE DISPENSE WITH GOD? 65 

possibilities of our being. Practical atheism and 
avowed atheism are one and the same in the final 
result. To have a bare intellectual apprehension of 
the Divine existence, and then allow no link to bind 
our life to His, to refuse Him our obedient trust and 
homage, to scorn His amazing overture in our especial 
behalf, is to cut loose from all blessed and permanent 
hope, and to join the fool to say out of the heart — 
"There is no God." We not onlv need God, but we 
need Him in the completest revelation of Himself. 
A wonderful being is man, a wonderful regard must 
God have for him, for if I may so speak, he needs God 
at his best — he needs God in Christ. The incarnation 
is a testimony to man's greatness, as well as to God's 
infinity of love and wisdom. 

But of this again ; meanwhile let us see the necessity 
of God in the practical results of theistic belief. We 
have had a brief view of the practical outcome of a 
reign of atheism. It is the darkest, dreariest page in 
the history of the world. It furnishes the unanswer- 
able proof that the world without God would be the 
sum of calamities. 

Many men who are wanting in religious experience 
believe in a God, and are in a measure controlled in 
their conduct by their belief. They entertain a degree 
of reverence for Him, and feel sure that society cannot 
be maintained in conditions of order and prosperity 
without such belief. Though only admitting an intel- 
lectual conviction of His being, they insist that men 
cannot dispense with God. They do not love Him as 



66 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

a Father, nor trust Him as a Saviour, yet they desire 
their children to be taught His law and His claims 
upon their reverence ; they would deprecate the abol- 
ishment of His worship from the community, and yet 
they have no heart for prayer, and no note for praise. 
Observation and intelligence are sufficient to convince 
them that proper character must underlie every source 
and condition of a righteous social order, and of a 
civilization that will conserve the best interests of the 
race, and that disbelief of God has never produced such 
character. Such men, entertaining such sense of God's 
being, and that great fact which inevitably follows 
their own personal accountability, are under moral re- 
straint, have regard for law, respect for virtue, and in 
not a few instances reverence for religion. It is a 
greater blessing than we are disposed to think that 
there is so general a conviction among men, in Chris- 
tianized communities, not only that there is a God, 
but that He is holy, doing truth and hating evil. Gen- 
eral morality is not wholly, but certainly no little 
dependent upon that conviction. 

It is not without significance that even among irre- 
ligious men there is a limit to profanity and blasphemy ; 
and, more than we know, they are hushed with awe 
under circumstances when the deepest reverence is 
alone appropriate. What would happen in the great 
city should that deep sense of personal responsibility 
which distinguishes man be suddenly blotted from the 
soul ? The awful record of the French Revolution tells 
the tale. One's blood chills to think of it. Whence 



CAN WE DISPENSE WITH GOD? 67 

this sense of responsibility, but from the conviction of 
a God. Expel God, and you break the sceptre of con- 
science in twain, and responsibility vanishes. Indeed, 
we may ask how or why the exercise of personal re- 
sponsibility, if God be abandoned? Responsibility is 
the link that still binds man to God, and a sense of it 
is often maintained where there is no evangelical faith. 
But if that link be cut in twain, lawlessness, a disregard 
of human rights, and consequent distress, are sure to 
follow. Surely it is a fact that will require no proof 
that wherever this consciousness of God is most devel- 
oped and most sovereign, there prevails the best order, 
the truest success, the greatest happiness : that is the 
community where the majesty of law is most re- 
garded, and where the vices and occupations that glut 
themselves at the sacrifice of the manhood of their vic- 
tims, and the peace and happiness of homes, flourish 
with the greatest limitation and difficulty. Let all men 
come to a devout and obedient faith in God, and it will 
not be long until they will want to see His face in Jesus 
Christ, and the descending glory of His more gracious 
coming will announce the dawn of a brighter and better 
day for the world. Now, while this intellectual convic- 
tion of God in men is not all He demands nor all men 
need, still it is an universal assent to the need of God— 
the confession of the rational soul that we cannot dis- 
pense with Him. His gifts are many, but He is the 
best. 

" Give what Thou canst, without Thee we are poor, 
And with Thee rich, take what Thou wilt away." 



68 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

But if we cannot dispense with this simple thought 
of God, if mere theistic belief, a belief so respectful as 
in some measure to influence the life, is a preserving 
salt to the community, if it exerts a wholesome re- 
straining influence on men, if it promotes virtue and 
tends to the order and peace of society, how much 
more we need that more direct and fuller revelation of 
God in Jesus Christ. A marvellous revelation is this ! 
The sublimest fact in history ! The great faculties in 
man make appeal to something above them, and yet 
something that has such correspondence with the 
human as to make actual approach possible. There is 
an answer to the appeal, fuller than the response of the 
light to the opening bud, and sweeter than the memory 
of mother-love to the lonely heart of the far-off pilgrim. 
God has approached us as a loving Father. Parting 
the veil of our earthly life, He has made known His 
mercy and solicitude in Jesus Christ. Do we know 
the depth of that condescension ? Do we know the 
height of the unearthly privilege it accords to us ? 
What a coronation God has given to human nature in 
that revelation ! Whether we look toward the inacces- 
sible light out of which it came, or at its sublime 
results among men, we may well exclaim — Great is the 
mystery of godliness, God manifest in the flesh — 0, the 
depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of 
God! Without this revelation it never would have 
been possible to attain to proper theistic belief, nor to 
maintain it in the world. 

It is the glory of Christianity that it has lifted the 



CAN WE DISPENSE WITH GOD? 69 

veil, and given men to realize the personality of God, 
to know that His love is as infinite as His power, and 
that the heart He redeems may see Him. With this 
unique conception of God the heathen world was star- 
tled, abashed, redeemed, and then it was that human 
life found an aim worthy of it, and that human nature 
kindled with a new inspiration, and has been mov- 
ing forward ever since to the vision of a new glory. 
Only where Jesus Christ, the brightness of the Father's 
glory, and the express image of His person, is preached, 
is the conception of God correct, and the lofty ends of 
His revelation achieved. It was this revelation of God 
over against the deification of emperors, that revolu- 
tionized the Roman empire, and has caused the heathen 
everywhere to cast his idols to the moles and to the 
bats. The world has never made wholesome progress 
where the redeeming Father God has been unknown, 
and not reverenced. What is the advantage ? Much 
every way. 

Now it is clear, the utterance of an unmistakable 
voice, that God is to be feared by the soul that delights 
in sin, and as certainly that He is to be sought by the 
soul that would be rid of its guilt and bondage. Jesus 
never put so much as the testimony of a look on the 
side of wrong ; by word and example He steadily re- 
buked the very appearance of evil ; but withal, the 
guiltiest soul when penitent and trustful was welcomed 
by Him, and in Him found the embrace of the Father. 
Could the world receive such a revelation of the char- 
acter of God, save through Jesus Christ? There is no 



JO VITAL QUESTIONS. 

line of history that tells that it ever did. Forever there 
was something lacking until Jesus came, and God was 
proclaimed as personal, supreme, the Father and Re- 
deemer of men. Before it was, " gods many," indefin- 
ite, unintelligible, helpless, without a charm, without a 
virtue ; now it is one God, the Father, of whom are all 
things, and we in Him ; and one Lord Jesus Christ, 
by whom are all things, and we by Him. Through 
Christianity the world has learned as never before 
that God's character is not only holy, but that His 
name is love, that He has infinite compassion and soli- 
citude for man. This new and charming view of God 
has been filling the world with a new life, a transcend- 
ant and inspiring hope, and a hallowed joy from the 
beginning; and it will deepen and widen until the whole 
earth shall become beautiful and glad with the splen- 
dor of its own transfiguration. Now that we have it, 
imagine the world without this revelation of God ! 
Every bright light now radiant on the path of human 
life would have gone out, and confidence in mere the- 
ism would be so shaken as to furnish nothing any 
more to prevent the midnight gloom of paganism from 
enfolding the despairing world. 

All that is sacred, and beautiful, and holy, would 
have disappeared ; the smiles of our children would 
mock us, the charm and welcome of home would be 
gone; while over no dying bed, or grass-grown grave, 
would any bright lamp swing, lighting the way to the 
sunny gates of immortality. But the revelation is here, 
and here to remain until the new heavens and the new 



CAN WE DISPENSE WITH GOD? J I 

earth proclaim the consummation of God's kingdom, 
and the final coronation of His Son. 

What a change has not this marvellous coming of 
God wrought ! What new and lofty conceptions it has 
given us of our fellow men ! With a new confidence 
it enables us to look up and to realize as never before 
that " we are God's offspring.'' How the need of this 
revelation is enforced by its own unspeakable results ! 
Who can tell its wonder ? Strange that any man can 
be indifferent to its benedictions. The coming of God 
in Jesus Christ our Lord has changed the whole aspect 
of human life; human progress has another temper 
now, and another goal. Everything worthy us has 
now a nobler impulse and a brighter promise. There 
is no need equal to ours, and in the revelation of God 
in Christ the need is not only more than met, but it is 
without any parallel in all that is good and great. 
This eloquent summary of Dr. Storrs is no exaggera- 
tion — Now " there is a courage and hopefulness of 
spirit not felt before: an expectation of better ages. 
There has passed a transcendent impulse into poetry ; 
and songs are now heard such as never before had 
stirred the air, exalting the spirit as with the rush of 
angelic plumes. Philosophy itself takes finer exactness, 
on higher levels, with larger range ; while the charac- 
teristic spiritual life of the modern believer infolds ele- 
ments unparalled, unimagined, in the earlier time. The 
lowliest feel themselves related to the Lord of the uni- 
verse. The little child feels it, as well as the mature ; 
the savage* just enlightened, as well as the cultured 



72 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

Christian disciple; the peasant uninstructed in human 
knowledge, only more easily than the savant. It is not 
strange to such, henceforth, that God has builded a city 
above, and has crowded it with glories w T hich men can- 
not prefigure, that they at last may have His rest. It 
is not strange or passing belief, that the hand which 
holds the universe together should wipe the tears from 
human eyes. The grandest, tenderest, most inspiring 
thought which the mind of the world has ever received 
is this of God, now made familiar to it through Jesus." 
Can we dispense with this blessed vision of the Holy 
One? Dare we hush this voice of God, and spurn this 
omnipotent arm extended in such love? Oh, amazing, 
touching overture of our loving Father! What do 
men everywhere need so much as to see God in the 
face of Jesus Christ? In that ineffable light, sin and 
sorrow, the world's care and the fear of death, all 
vanish ; there too we see the herald gleams of that 
immortality which has been brought to light through 
the Gospel. 

Out of Christ, our God is a consuming fire. Then 
mercy has departed, and who can escape the verdict of 
eternal justice. Then, there is no Days-Man, no Me- 
diator between us, and the voice of the compassionate 
Father is lost in the abysmal depths. Oh, it is God in 
Christ men need, must have, or perish. The question 
is not, Can we dispense with God? but rather, Will we 
accept our great opportunity, our one adequate chance 
of eternal redemption? Will we avail ourselves of the 
complete rescue offered to us for the befngs we are, 



CAN WE DISPENSE WITH GOD? 73 

the life we are living, and the wonderful destiny await- 
ing us? With what heart are we answering back to 
God's amazing interposition in Jesus Christ? Every- 
thing vital for time and eternity depends upon that. 
Do we want God ? Has He not shown that He wants 
us far more than we want Him? Is not this one of 
the voices coming up out of the infinite depths of the 
incarnation? How vast, but how blessed the truth — 

" A truth so strange, 'twere bold to think it true, 
If not far bolder still to disbelieve." 

Only as we are brought nigh through Him who 
came to show us God, can we glorify God, and attain 
to His sublime purpose in us. What men need on 
such a question as this is not argument, not evasion, 
not resistance, but faith — faith in God, as His charac- 
ter may be known, as His purpose may be interpreted, 
as His voice may be heard, and as His own life may 
be imbibed and manifested through Jesus Christ His 
Son. 

It is faith, reverent, obedient faith, that causes all 
difficulties to vanish, and instead of protest against 
God's approach, fills the heart with great longings for 
Him. It was not simply a knowledge of the fact of 
God's revelation in Christ, but faith in it, the self-pos- 
session of it through faith, that enabled Augustine to 
look up in such hallowed trust and pray, " Help me, 
my Strength ! by whom alone I stand ; shine on me, 
my Light ! by whom alone I see ; and quicken me, my 
Life! by whom alone I live!" A faith that interprets 
4 



74 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

such a Deity to mind and heart, begets and nourishes 
every holy affection, keeps the conscience illumined 
with the very light of God, transfigures the whole life 
making it a picture of heaven, and reveals man at his 
best. To every such soul the Apostle's great prayer 
is constantly being answered — That lie would grant 
you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strength- 
ened with miglit by His Spirit in the inner man; that 
Christ may dzvell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being 
rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend 
with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and 
depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ which 
passeth knowledge ^ that ye might be filled with all the 
fulness of God. 



CHAPTER IV. 
IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 

IT has been claimed in these pages that God has 
revealed Himself directly to man through the Chris- 
tian Scriptures. If this be true, the book we call the 
Bible must be inspired, that is to say, that in so far as 
it is a correct copy of the original, it was written under 
the enlightenment and guidance of the Holy Ghost. 
We claim for the Bible that it is not the word of man's 
wisdom, but that Word in which God has addressed 
us through the Spirit. This claim, along with every 
other profession of Christianity, has been called in 
question. From the beginning, the Bible like the 
Saviour whom it reveals, has been the subject of every 
form and of every temper of attack. Surely nothing 
that genius could invent or hatred could produce, has 
been omitted in the long persistent effort to invalidate 
the claims of the Holy Scriptures to a Divine origin, 
and to destroy the confidence so many of the most 
enlightened and best of the earth have so long reposed 
in them. That such prodigious effort, with so much 
to its advantage, should have achieved so indifferent a 
success, might well be regarded as significant, and as 
contributing unwilling testimony to the truth of the 
claim made. 

(75) 



y6 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

We propose to deal simply with the question of in- 
spiration, and not so much with theories as with the 
fact. The question is not without its difficulties, not 
because it cannot be proven, but because it is wholly 
spiritual; and while within the grasp of the finite as a 
fact, is beyond it in its compass and methods. In the 
beginning we are met with the difficulty always attend- 
ing any effort to define the question of inspiration. 
Spiritual influence is always attended with mystery. 
But in the character and results of the Holy Scriptures 
we are just as much assured of the fact, as we are of 
the fact of regeneration in the renewed man. In our 
own experience we have often found it much easier to 
describe than to define what we have felt : so with the 
profound subject of inspiration. The inspired writers 
of God's Book describe their experience, and furnish us 
the results of it, but they avoid definition. That be- 
longs to a higher realm. If we can be assured of the 
fact, we have sufficient to challenge, even to demand 
faith, and for more we may easily wait the day of fuller 
revelation. To oppose the doctrine of inspiration it has 
been necessary to conceive objections. Among the 
most pretentious of these is the charge that such a 
revelation as we possess in the Scriptures is not possi- 
ble. Virtually that opinion, — for that is all it is, — re- 
solves itself into atheism. To admit the being of God, 
and then deny the Scriptures on the ground that such 
a revelation is not possible, is absurd. Certainly it was 
a sublime condescension in God to give us such a rev- 
elation, but to call it an impossibility, is an insult alike 
to His power and love. 



IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? J*J 

Again, it is charged that the Bible contradicts science, 
and hence cannot be inspired. This charge has less 
support to-day, when science has reached its largest de- 
velopment, than at any other time in the world's history. 
Men forget that truth in one sphere cannot contradict 
truth in another. The conclusions of science must be 
absolutely settled before they can be fairly used against 
God's Book : but when they are absolutely settled, it 
will be found that there is no contradiction between 
God's revelation in science and in the inspired Word. 
They speak with one voice in two departments of His 
great kingdom. Moreover, it would not be candid to dis- 
regard the fact that the Bible is not a text-book of sci- 
ence, though it contains truths belonging to the realm of 
science which the ablest doubters have never been able 
to master. Scripture interpretation has more than once 
gone counter to the undoubted conclusions of science; 
but the Bible as God has given it, and kept to its mis- 
sion, will be found, while never violating a single prin- 
ciple of true science, to have an aim far above it. 
Indeed, one of the marvels of the Sacred Writings is 
their harmony with all true knowledge, — a fact that is 
constantly gaining as the world becomes more enlight- 
ened. I cannot wonder that such giants in the realm 
of science as Faraday, and Henry, and Dana, and Guyot, 
and Dawson, plant themselves on the side of truth, and 
u maintain that there is no real conflict between the 
really ascertained facts of science and the first two 
chapters of Genesis rightly interpreted." The Darwin- 
ian theory presents no difficulty here, for it remains to 



/8 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

this day only an opinion without any proof to sustain 
it. But all charge of scientific inaccuracy must fail to 
weaken the claim of the Scriptures to a Divine origin, 
when it is borne in mind that their aim is far other than 
to teach science. For all that, it is enough to know 
that the Bible teaches no error. As Baronius says, — 
" The purpose of Holy Scripture is to teach us how to 
go to heaven, not how the heavens go." 

Again, it is declared that the Bible not only contra- 
dicts science, but that it contradicts itself. How unbe- 
lieving men have searched the Scriptures as with a 
lighted candle, gone up and down in them, not to find 
truth — nothing could have been farther from their 
thoughts — but to find statements of different authors 
recording the same events which seem to cross each 
other, so that if possible they might discover some- 
thing that would reflect upon the record. Had they 
given half the zeal to the searching of their own hearts 
they would have found error enough, and none greater 
than their hatred of the Book they have labored to 
destroy. These apparent contradictions, into a detailed 
statement of which we cannot enter here, have been 
thoroughly investigated again and again, and have 
been found to be errors of translation, or to result from 
the description of different parts of the same event, 
and therefore only apparent. Of course the most rea- 
sonable and conclusive explanation has not always 
satisfied the objector, nor may we hope for such a re- 
sult in many. Mr. Garbett has reconciled one hundred 
and forty-four passages, supposed to be inconsistent 



IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 79 

with each other, by the application of this simple and 
just rule: "Variations of statements are not contra- 
dictions when they arise either from recording different 
parts of some common event, or from assigning a dif- 
ferent emphasis and importance to the same parts." 
For a detailed statement of these apparent contradic- 
tions in the Scriptures, we must refer the reader to the 
numerous volumes which have so ably and completely 
vindicated the different writers of the Bible from the 
charge of conflicting assertions. The astonishing 
wonder about the Scriptures is not any jarring or dis- 
cord, but the marvellous unity that distinguishes them 
from beginning to end, and binds them as by the clasp 
of God's own hand into one magnificent whole. The 
singular accuracy of the sacred writers confirms the 
inspiration of what they wrote. 

From objections let us now turn to some statement 
of the doctrine. The claim of inspiration is for the 
original Scriptures, and for our Bible in so far as the 
translation is free from error. The miracle of inspira- 
tion is not perpetuated in those who have copied and 
translated the Scriptures, though the accepted transla- 
tion is so entirely free from fundamental error, that 
fairness must conclude that God has wonderfully 
preserved the purity of the original text in the trans- 
mission. Prof. Moses Stuart, one of the ablest biblical 
scholars of modern times, says : " Out of some eight 
hundred thousand various readings of the Bible that 
have been collected, about seven hundred and ninety- 
five thousand are of about as much importance to the 



80 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

sense of the Greek and Hebrew Scriptures as the 
question in English orthography is, whether the word 
honour shall be spelled with a u or without it. Of the 
remainder some change the sense of particular passa- 
ges or expressions, or omit particular words or 
phrases ; but no one doctrine of religion is changed, 
not one precept is taken away, not one important fact 
is altered, by the whole of the various readings collec- 
tively taken." In the transmission of a book through 
so many hands, languages and ages, some discrepan- 
cies must be expected ; but that they are so few, and 
so indifferent, gives room for the agency of the human 
on the one hand, and as clearly proves the care and 
guidance of the Divine on the other. To enter pro- 
test against the inspiration of the Scriptures on account 
of these occasional faint discrepancies, is to take ad- 
vantage of a quibble, and to found an argument on 
sand. 

It is clear that revelation, which precedes the record 
of it, not only must, but has provided for its faithful 
transmission. As Dorner says: " This is involved in 
the founding of Christianity itself, as a historical power 
destined to live. As such the power of self-preser- 
vation must be innate in Christianity. Else it would 
not have been adequately equipped for really passing 
over to humanity as a spiritual possession, as believed 
and known truth ; for, providing humanity had Chris- 
tianity as an actual possession, and as an element of 
its being, it could testify to and diffuse it, from which 
it clearly appears the actual transition of Christianity 



IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED ? 8 1 

to humanity is identical with its capacity of propaga- 
tion." That God has so wonderfully preserved the 
Word, is alike His own assurance that the Scriptures 
are inspired, and that they shall abide forever. Reve- 
lation was made before the record of it, Christianity 
existed before there was a Bible in the form we pos- 
sess it. Christianity does not depend upon inspiration, 
but inspiration does depend upon Christianity. If 
Christianity be not true, then inspiration is without 
meaning; but Christianity is true, and therefore we 
have an inspired and an authoritative revelation of it. 
The gates of hell may as little prevail against the one 
as against the other. 

But in what sense were these sacred writers inspired? 
In other words, what do we mean by that specific in- 
spiration which we claim for the Holy Scriptures? 
Restricting the word " Inspiration" to the particular 
subject in hand, it is that continued superintendence 
which God graciously exercised over the sacred 
writers in recording His revelation, for the purpose of 
securing to mankind a record wholly free from error, 
so constituting the entire Bible in all its parts the very 
word of God to us. 

Holy men of God spake as they were moved by the 
Holy Ghost. This is a comprehensive statement, but 
it is not obscure. Inspiration and character as a rule- 
go together. In this instance God breathed upon and 
communicated His will through men who were en- 
titled to be called "holy." 

These men who wrote the Bible were not learned 



82 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

in the wisdom of the world, but they were holy, and 
holiness interprets God, and communes with Him. 
He always communicates His will to the holy man. 
These holy men did not speak at random ; they did 
not deliver a mere personal opinion; they spake as 
they were moved by the Holy Ghost — not from any 
remarkable gift of genius, nor from any advanced 
moral and spiritual state to which they had attained, 
but under the enlightenment and guidance of a special 
endowment for a particular work. They spake as they 
were moved, as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. 
This inspiration was special, not ordinary but extra- 
ordinary; it was for a time and purpose, and has never 
been repeated. We cannot, therefore, agree with Mr. 
Morell, who in his " Philosophy of Religion," says : 
" Inspiration depends upon the clearness, force and ac- 
curacy of a man's religious intuitions * * *. It does 
not involve any form of intelligence essentially differ- 
ent from what we already possess * * *. It is a 
higher potency of a certain form of consciousness 
which every man to some degree possesses." This 
view makes a similar inspiration to that with which the 
writers of God's Word were endowed, possible to 
others, perpetuates the endowment, destroys its specific 
character, and by so much as it is generalized and 
made dependent on human gifts, weakens its force. 
This gives opportunity to criticise and find fault with 
the Bible, as with any human production, a privilege 
of which the author of the theory above mentioned 
avails himself. That God wrought through human 



IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 83 

faculties, and that human characteristics were retained 
and are manifest, is certainly true; but that the inspira- 
tion we claim for the Scriptures consisted only in 
" brightening and elevating the intuitional faculty," is 
not true, else the Book we call the revelation of God is 
only the word of man, and may be produced by any 
one in whom there may be discovered " a higher 
potency of a certain form of consciousness, which 
every man to some degree possesses. " 

In communicating His word to man, God did not 
look for rare human faculties. In great part the human 
agency is a striking illustration of the truth that it is 
with the weak things of the world God confounds the 
mighty. We come back to the sublime statement 
with which we started, which is the unanswerable an- 
swer to this and all other theories that aim to over- 
throw the doctrine of inspiration by denying its specific 
character and mission — Holy men of God spake as they 
zvere moved by the Holy Ghost. It was only when they 
were engaged in this work that they so spake. No 
matter what impulse moved them at other times, no 
matter what they did when otherwise occupied, what 
we insist upon is that when engaged in recording the 
Divine Word, they were so enlightened and controlled 
by the Holy Spirit as to be preserved from error. In 
other respects, doubtless, they made mistakes, yielded 
to human infirmities, it may be through ignorance and 
temptation fell into sin ; but when they stood up in the 
name of Christ to speak, or sat down to write, it was 
not in the words of man's wisdom, but in the word in 



84 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

which the Holy Ghost teacheth. The infirmities of 
these men in the ordinary affairs of life furnish no argu- 
ment against the doctrine of inspiration. If God pre- 
served them from mistake in this one great achieve- 
ment, if He chose them as the instruments for the 
accomplishment of a work which He meant should be 
complete and permanent, it does not follow that He 
made them equally infallible in other occupations and 
at other times. Ordinarily they were like other Chris- 
tian men, under the influence of the Spirit of grace; 
but when engaged in speaking or w T riting the Divine 
will their endowment w r as unusual and specific. Of 
this the Sacred Word is itself the unanswerable proof, 
for, as one well says : " It is as unaccountable in its dis- 
closures, history and position, without the admission 
of special inspiration, as the world and the fullness 
thereof without the creating and upholding hand of 
God." 

Another question belonging to a statement of the 
doctrine of inspiration is its scope. How far does it 
extend? Is the entire Bible inspired, or only a part 
of it? Is it possible or proper to maintain the theory 
of plenary inspiration? Has God spoken to us in Gen- 
esis as well as in Revelation, in Ruth and Job as well 
as in the Acts and in the Epistles, in the Psalms and 
the Prophets as well as in the Gospels ? We believe 
He has. The Scriptures most forcibly make this broad 
claim for themselves. All Scripture is given by inspi- 
ration of God. Alone, this statement would not be 
taken as final, nor is the position subjected to that ex- 



IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 85 

tremity. The proofs are abundant. The word just 
quoted is numerously repeated. God said to Moses, 
/ will be with thy mouth. The prophets only presumed 
to speak in the name of the Lord, and were careful to 
command their hearers to hear the word of the Lord. 
Over and over again the Old Testament is quoted in 
the New, and no one of the sacred writers endorses it 
with such confidence and emphasis as Jesus Christ 
Himself. Search the Scriptures, was His command. 
He confirmed His own speech by saying, as it is writ- 
ten, and that it might be fulfilled. You remember how 
He upbraided the disciples and said, fools and slow 
of heart to believe all that the prophets have spoken! 
* * * And beginning at Moses and all the prophets, He 
expounded unto them in all these Scriptures the things 
concerning Himself. Luke xxiv. 25-27. These are the 
zvords which L spake unto you, that all things must be 
fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses and in 
the prop] icts, and in the Psalms co?tcerning me. Luke 
xxiv. 44. Think not that I am come to destroy the law 
or the prophets : L am not come to destroy, but to fulfill. 
For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, 
one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, 
until all be fulfilled. Matt. v. 17, 18. With such testi- 
mony to the inspiration of the ancient Scriptures, we 
may well say with Wordsworth, " The New Testament 
canonizes the Old ; the Incarnate Word sets his seal on 
the Written Word. The Incarnate Word is God, — 
therefore, the inspiration of the Old Testament is au- 
thenticated by God himself." With the inspiration of 



86 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

the Old Testament established, why should we doubt 
the Divine origin of the New, so largely made up of 
it, and so indissolubly connected with it? I have re- 
ferred to the singular unity of the Bible. It certainly 
furnishes convincing testimony in behalf of the plenary 
inspiration of the Scriptures. Here is a collection of 
many books, written by nearly as large a number of 
persons separated from each other "as by the stepping- 
stones of centuries," with great variety of outward cir- 
cumstances and conditions, and that too in a dark age, 
when men were low down, and there seemed but little 
hope for improvement, — when the fulfillment of God's 
promises all lay in the future, and hope was compelled 
to rest on faith or go out in darkness. In such a time 
the prophets wrote, and yet, beginning with Genesis 
and coming down to the " fulness of time," what a unity 
of plan and purpose is easily noticed. Who will venture 
to point out the discord, as these varied notes sounding 
through the centuries at last gather into one full round 
choral reverberating in the skies of Bethlehem, and yet 
to swell loud and complete in the song of Moses and 
the Lamb. It is wonderful : and when we remember 
that " the Bible is a sublime symphony framed about 
the theme of man's reconciliation with God," it is de- 
lightful, and it requires a monstrous incredulity to re- 
fuse to see "the finger of God inditing and unfolding 
the whole." The plan, the spirit, the purpose of this 
strange Book, maintained as one from first to last, de- 
clares it to be from God. In the eloquent words of 
Dr. J. P. Thompson, " Such mighty conceptions could 



IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 8? 

have originated only in the mind that encircles all 
worlds, possesses all ages, directs all events, — and the 
progressive unity of redemption through all the lines 
of prophecy, ritual, and history in the Bible, is the un- 
veiling there of the mind of God." To mutilate this 
holy Book, to call it part God's and part man's, is, we 
believe, to seriously impair its wholeness, to imperil the 
parts, to break up its sublime continuity, and to incur 
the penalty of such an unwarranted venture: — If any 
man shall take away from the words of the book of this 
prophecy , God shall take away his part out of the book 
of life, and out of the holy city, and from the things which 
are written in tins book. We declare it then to be our 
sincere faith that the Holy Scriptures are inspired — in- 
spired so as to be a statement of truth and not of error; 
inspired so as to constitute in themselves the Word of 
God, and not simply to contain it, along with much else' 
that man's wisdom is at liberty to dispose of as it ex- 
pands with the ages. Some go one step further, and 
contend for the verbal inspiration of the Scriptures: 
that not only every part, not only the thought, but the 
words in which the truth is conveyed are inspired. I 
do not stand now for the verbal inspiration of the Scrip- 
tures. I only say that there is nothing in the method, 
so far as we know it, to render it impossible. If God 
can and has inspired the thought, why may He not 
have cared that the very words through which the 
thought is expressed should be inspired also? At least 
they are wonderful words, and they convey to us not 
the errors and mistakes of men. but the truth of God. 



88 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

Good men differ on this point, and yet hold to the 
Scriptures as the inspired record of God's revelation, 
and liberty may be granted here without breaking con- 
fidence in the Word as the book of God. 

From this brief statement of the doctrine, let us turn 
to some of the proofs by which it is sustained. While 
not in itself conclusive, it is still a fair support of the 
claim of a divine origin made for the Scriptures, that it 
has in all time been the faith of the Church. Her tri- 
umphs in all ages have been unmistakably identified 
with this fact. Not by any philosophy or word of 
man, but by the preaching of the inspired gospel of 
the grace of God, have all the sublime victories of 
Christianity been achieved. Only through the Scrip- 
tues could the Reformation have been at all possible. 
Dr. Wescott, in his able Introduction to the Study of 
the Gospels, has collected the testimony of the Fathers. 
Clemens Romanus declares the Scriptures to be the 
"true utterances of the Holy Ghost." Tertullian calls 
them "the writings and the words of God." Cyprian 
says the " Gospel cannot stand in part and fall in part." 
Clement of Alexandria declares that the Word shall 
abide — "for the mouth of the Lord, the Holy Spirit, 
spake it." Origen is quoted as teaching the infallibil- 
ity of the Scriptures on the ground that — "they were 
accurately written by the cooperation of the Holy 
Ghost." It is, indeed, true that some who are justly en- 
titled to the dignity of scholarship, in time past as well 
as now, have disputed the claim of inspiration; but it 
is equally true that in all the centuries those who have 



IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 89 

illustrated the spirit, and been instrumental in achiev- 
ing the purpose of God's Word, have heartily believed 
in its divine origin and authority. What the Bible has 
wrought must be accounted for, but how can this be 
done save on the ground that it is unquestionably the 
voice of God to the world? No other of the so-called 
sacred books has achieved anything like its success, 
either in the character or extent of it. That the Bible 
has no parallel in these respects is surely not without 
significance. 

This brings us to the Book itself. It is easy to 
affirm that the Bible is without any parallel among 
books, as Christ was without an equal among men. So 
long has it been in the world, and so marvellously has 
it survived the fiercest opposition, and with such start- 
ling accuracy have its predictions and mission been ful- 
filled, that we may justly claim that its singular history 
is more than a trifling testimony to its supreme origin. 
Undoubtedly it has made its impress upon the centu- 
ries, and like carvings in the granite they remain. 
That we have this Book at all, and that it confirms 
every day its own assurance that it is to abide for- 
ever, is itself a miracle. 

It was written by obscure and for the most part un- 
learned men, the inhabitants of a despised nation, and 
in an age distinguished most by its limitation in all 
that tends to progress and hope ; besides, it has been 
scorned, picked, and held up to ridicule, buffeted and 
cast out, as was Jesus in Pilate's Hall; and yet the lan- 
guages in which it is printed, the number of copies an- 






9 o 



VITAL QUESTIONS. 



nually issued, and the readers who delight in its pages, 
are greater to-day than at any other time in the history 
of the world. Thousands of volumes written against 
it are long since cast away and forgotten, while a like 
fate awaits all similar productions. They are as want- 
ing in sincerity and in the elements of perpetual life, 
as they are lacking in love and sympathy. To 
human nature even at its worst their touch is cold, 
and no bad man thinks to call for his infidel book 
that he may be helped to die. How different the 
blessed Bible ! It survives alike the imprudence and 
unfaithfulness of friends and the malicious endeavors 
of foes, and shines on every age, and into every will- 
ing heart, serene as the face of God. There is noth- 
ing great and good pertaining to literature in which 
the Bible does not excel. It is more than a thing 
of words, more than a narrative; it is a life, the 
breathings of the soul of God, and its light can no 
more be extinguished by the opposition of men than 
the stars can be put out by the breath of an infant, or 
the howling rage of the tempest. With great beauty 
and equal truthfulness, Theodore Parker says : " Some 
thousand famous writers come up in this century to 
be forgotten in the next. But the silver cord of the 
Bible is not loosed nor its golden bowl broken, as Time 
chronicles his tens of centuries passed by." 

What have not men suffered — what have they not 
given for this Book of books? To publish its glad tid- 
ings where have they not gone, and what have they not 
endured? How its sublime and comforting teachings 



IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 9 1 

have thrilled on the strings of the heart, in the darkest 
hours, as if they had been touched by the fingers of 
an angel! Is there not some holy inspiration in and 
about it? Is it not God's sweet letter of kindly counsel 
and comfort to His children? Are not these facts 
unanswerable testimony to the claim we make for it? 

In addition, how strangely it seems to fit us at all 
times and under all circumstances. Where is the book 
that is so entirely the book of all mankind ? Never 
did a human heart beat, never a human life exist, 
whose every need for time and eternity was not con- 
templated in the spirit, doctrine, and aim of the Holy 
Scriptures. Some one has called it "all men's book." 
Who that has tried it, trusted it, loves it, will not con- 
firm this statement? Like Jesus, whom it reveals, it 
demands the uttermost parts of the earth for a posses- 
sion; and during the roll of the centuries, and without 
seeming effort, has it not quietly, but surely, advanced 
from the " local to the universal." It offers its leaves 
now for the healing of the nations, and the offer has be- 
come one of the most unmistakable facts of history. 
Once in type, symbol and gorgeous ritual, but now in 
the majesty of the Cross, it speaks to all men, and noth- 
ing is plainer than that all men need the message and 
life it brings. When they hear, they serve their day 
and generation by the will of God, and leave the world 
not worse, but better than they found it. How won- 
derful it is! Has any other book ever produced such 
results ? Who will explain the marvel, apart from the 
inspiration of the book ? 



92 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

Still another fact is significant. It is one with which 
we are all familiar. It is the fact that in proportion 
as men are base, low down in fleshly indulgence, they 
scorn and hate the Bible. To the feet of the noblest 
and purest of earth it is the guiding lamp, their shield 
in temptation, their comfort in sorrow, their glad evan- 
gel in death. It is far other to bad men. When men 
are set to do wrong, the Bible is not the book they con- 
sult to help them out. For wrong-doing men instinct- 
ively turn aw T ay from the Bible. What meaneth it, if 
the Bible be a delusion, an imposition upon human 
intelligence, and a hindrance to human progress, that 
bad men, the world over, so heartily hate it? Strange 
phenomenon this ! Why hate the very spirit, princi- 
ple and purpose which permeates all their criminal 
indulgence, which they certainly do, if the Bible be 
the corrupt, fraudulent piece of human ingenuity they 
claim it is? If the Bible be a fabrication, then I 
should expect that its influence would be positively 
bad, and that good men everywhere would oppose it ; 
but I find that good men love it, and that many men 
once bad have been made better by it. In reason 
then I can only respect my intelligence as well as my 
manhood, and conclude that — 

" What none can prove a forgery may be true, 
What none but bad men wish exploded, must." 

After all, it is the practical test that settles beyond 
dispute the claim of the Scriptures to divine authority. 
In its external influence we have seen that the Bible 
is without any rival. An argument equally strong 



IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 93 

may be based upon its internal character. How appa- 
rent its frankness of statement ! There is no air of im- 
position about it. It never betrays any purpose of 
deception. No candid mind can help but feel that it 
has an unselfish and noble aim. It never hides the 
truth, though the revelation discloses the weaknesses 
and errors of those most prominent in it. If Moses 
contradicts his character of meekness, it says so. If 
Abraham perverts truth, it exposes the falsehood. If 
Elijah blushes the mastery of his faith by pitiable un- 
belief, it protests with condemnation. If Jacob dis- 
sembles, it unmasks the deception. If David soils his 
kingly robes with dreadful sin, his crown is no protec- 
tion from exposure and rebuke. The worst features 
of Peter's denial are told with greatest exactness. Be- 
yond question, of all books the Bible is unmatched 
for the thorough-going honesty of its statements. Its 
sweetness, its purity, its uncompromising protest 
against all wrong, its power to elevate and ennoble the 
mind, to give men fear for what God hates, arid rever- 
ence and respect for what He loves, compel me to 
give hearty consent to this thesis of Henry Rogers : 
" That the Bible is not such a book as man would have 
made if he could; or could have made if he would." 

But the Bible has not only made a history for itself; 
it has produced an experience whose testimony it is 
impossible to gainsay. Coleridge said, " I know the 
Bible is inspired, because it finds me at greater depths 
of my being than any other book." It has not only 
proven its adaptation to our greatest soul requirements, 



94 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

but it has furnished new elements of character and life. 
By its sublime disclosure of the character of God, its 
unveiling of the fact and guilt of human sin, and its 
proclamation of redemption through Jesus Christ our 
Lord, it has transformed the nature of a countless mul- 
titude, and enabled them to live here after the pattern 
of the Son of God. There is a power in its tone, a 
mastery in its appeal, that belongs to it alone. The 
very barriers men have set up to resist it, it has over- 
come again and again, and gathered trophies from 
among its bitterest foes. Even Rousseau said, "This 
Divine book, the only book indispensable for the Chris- 
tian, only needs to be meditated upon to carry into the 
soul the love of its author, and the desire to fulfill his 
precepts." The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the 
soul. The testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the 
simple. The statutes of the Lord are right, rejoicing 
the heart. The commandment of the Lord is pure, en- 
lightening the eyes. The judgments of the Lord are true 
and righteous altogether. These quaint lines of the 
poet speak the experience of millions, — 

" Every hour 
I read you kills a sin, 
Or lets a virtue in 
To fight against it." 

What a testimony personal experience brings to the 
inspiration of the Scriptures ! Is the very best human 
character and life to be set back as an unreliable wit- 
ness to the divine origin of God's Book ? Is* not every 
truly saved man alike an illustration and a witness to 



IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? 95 

the truth that holy men of God spake as they were 
moved by the Holy Ghost. If through the infallilble 
Word I have found my way to the heart of God, and 
learned to do His will in humility and meekness ; if I 
have found a new and holy inspiration and a noble 
purpose for my life ; if my progress is toward the per- 
fect image of the sinless One, what shall I say of the 
origin of the instrument employed ? Will it be a rea- 
sonable and satisfactory answer to say that this Book 
is the ingenious invention of man, and in no sense in- 
volves the question of eternal life? In the face of its 
spirit and results, such a thought is revolting. This 
Book is the very vision of God put within the grasp 
of man, enlightened by the Spirit that controlled its 
authors. Moses prayed that he might see God's glory; 
here the Apocalypse looms up, and we behold the 
Divine majesty in the face of Jesus; but preceding 
this, it is still more, when in response to personal faith 
it becomes the power of God and the wisdom of God 
unto salvation. Its perpetual miracle is the miracle 
of the new life, with all its attendant excellence. Its 
victories are not in one land, but in every land ; not 
in one race, but in every race. Wherever men live it 
speaks in the tongue in which they were born. Give 
it dominion in the community, city, or nation, and the 
community, city and nation are saved. It enshrines 
not some, but every virtue, as the sun enshrines the 
light. We may defy the world to furnish the single 
man for whose moral ruin the Bible is justly charge- 
able. Who can count the witnesses on the other side ? 



g6 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

They are an exceeding great army, many of them 
standing before the throne without fault, with a rem- 
nant still here who in holy lives and noble, kindly 
ministries, continue to bless the world. We chal- 
lenge any man to produce the single truth, or virtue, 
or grace, or law, that tends to the purity and safety of 
the home, to the order and peace of society, or to the 
good of humanity in any way, that is not found in this 
Book. Men are tempted, tried, and doomed to die. 
Where do they find a shelter from any of the storms 
that ruffle the face of our present life, like that con- 
tained in the tender promises and assurances of the 
Word of God? Human sorrow itself has more than 
once given a blessed distinctness to its message. 
Many, I am sure, can respond to this word of Arch- 
bishop Trench: "What an interpreter of Scripture is 
affliction ! How many stars hi its heaven shine out 
brightly in the night of sorrow or of pain. * * * 
Trouble of spirit, condemnation of conscience, pain of 
body, sudden danger, strong temptation — when any of 
these overtakes us, what veils do they take away that 
we may see what hitherto we saw not ; what new do- 
mains of God's Word do they bring within our spirit- 
ual ken'! How do promises which once fell flat upon 
our ears, become precious now, psalms become our 
own, our heritage forever, which were before aloof 
from us ! " 

Marvellous, blessed Book, is the Holy Bible ! Who 
can gainsay the testimony of the heart and the life 
to its masterly energy and helping truth ? Who that 



IS THE BIBLE INSPIRED? gj 

has fairly tried it ever thinks to give it up? Blessed 
be God, it has survived all opposition, and its bow still 
abides in strength. The ages to come will produce no 
resistance it cannot master. Its friends and foes alike 
shall go to the grave, the grass shall wither, and the 
flowers shall fade, but the Word of the Lord shall abide 
forever. As a thousand rays of light point to the sun 
as their source, so a thousand facts disclose the hand- 
writing of God in the Scriptures, while ten thousand 
times ten thousand voices declare that in the Bible we 
have no cunningly devised fable, but the living Word 
of the living God. View the Bible as we may, I am 
frank to say that I cannot fairly account for it on any 
other ground than that it is from God. The Book 
itself is a greater miracle than any it records. The 
disbelief and neglect of it is one of the greatest sins, 
one of the most terrible misfortunes of the time. To 
quench the light God has given us, and to walk and 
achieve by the dim deceptive glare of human wisdom, 
is indeed to walk in the darkness, and to blast all help- 
ful and enduring hope. Young men and all men, what 
shall I say to exalt it in your esteem, to bring you 
trustfully and prayerfully to search the Scriptures? 
You can do without it, — many have, and many still do, 
— but not to any worthy success here, nor to any peace 
and joy hereafter. No Bible means no God, no Sav- 
iour, no heaven. 

Young man, is that the destiny you have chosen ? 
How shall I turn you from such a course? May I say, 
by the mother that bore you, taught your infant lips 
5 



98 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

to pray, showed you Jesus and the truth of His Gospel 
in her character and life, then, when the evening came, 
and the angels drew nigh, took the blessed Bible and 
put it under her head for a pillow, and calmly said, Now 
Lord, lettest thou thy servant depart iii peace, for mine 
eyes have seen thy salvation: yet more, by memories all 
sacred and sweet, because set like jewels in the truth 
of Holy Scripture, let me urge you to give to God's 
Word your prayerful attention, your sincere trust, and 
your unfaltering obedience. The Bible is God's voice, 
God's revelation to you. Who can close his ears and 
his heart to such a message without incurring the most 
dreadful consequences ? Will any reader of these lines 
brave the venture? However it be, this is sure, "We 
have a Bible competent to calm our doubts and speak 
to our weakness. It is authoritative, for it is the voice 
of God; it is intelligible, for it is in the language of 
men." 

" Within this awful Volume lies 
The mystery of mysteries ! 
Happiest they of human race, 
To whom God has granted grace 
To read, to fear, to hope, to pray, 
To lift the latch and force the way ; 
And better had they ne'er been born, 
Who read to doubt, or read to scorn." 

Walter Scott. 



CHAPTER V. 

THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST, 

THE brunt of infidel attack to-day is aimed at the 
person of Christ To set aside the supreme claim 
Christianity makes for Him as its Founder, is the 
chief purpose of modern skepticism. This done, the 
most formidable obstacle in the way of the overthrow 
of the Christian faith would be removed, and triumph 
assured. There is a willingness to admit that Christ 
was very good, even great for His time, yet not good 
beyond the attainments of others, and the possibilities 
of many. 

Plato and Buddha are made equal companions with 
Him, and men even claiming the high functions of 
religious teachers have the boldness to declare that 
there are " other Saviours than Jesus Christ. ,, It would 
seem that the most ordinary intelligence would easily 
discover the infinite disparity between the character 
and mission of our Lord and these late rivals, but 
there is no telling what ventures unbelief will not 
adopt. Strauss and his followers see in Jesus only a 
distinguished religious genius, one of the best of men, 
the product of a moral life of which many are the 
depositaries, and only a Son of God as He stood above 
others, and more fully opened His moral being to the 
inflow of the Divine influence. 

(99) 



IOO VITAL QUESTIONS. 

This patronizing, and as we believe low and irrever- 
ent view of the person of Christ, is the loud, sometimes 
arrogant, proclamation of infidelity to-day. Some pro- 
fessors teach it, some periodicals print it, and some 
ministers preach it, and hence it is that the worst foes 
of the truth are not those who strike from without, but 
those who in the name of religion deal their blows 
from within. The author of " Ecce Homo" complains 
that after reading many books on Christ, He is still 
incomprehensible to him, and then, strangely enough, 
he sets about to relieve his perplexity by presenting 
Christ as " a young man of promise, popular with 
those who knew him, and appearing to enjoy the 
Divine favor." Just the opposite of this, it is plain 
enough that a new mystery comes to Christianity 
when its Founder is discrowned of His Divinity — not a 
mystery that we may not touch because of its infinite 
height, but a mystery that depreciates the mission of 
Christ, and so weakens and confuses the appeal of 
Christianity as to wholly destroy its force upon the 
minds and hearts of men. 

As Sartorius says : " They who deny the divinity of 
Christ, and regard Him after the Jewish fashion as a 
mere man, or after heathen fashion as a demigod or 
deified creature, deny also the greatness of the Divine 
love manifested in the surrender of the only begotten 
Son, and thereby obscure, nay deny, the whole Divine 
work of reconciliation and reunion of man with God 
— a work so great and Divine, that it could be effected 
neither by a mere man nor by any kind of interme- 



THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. IOI 

diate being, but only by Him who unites in Himself 
both Godhead and manhood." The great work of 
redemption is as indissolubly associated with the 
human-divine Christ, as it is with the Holy Spirit who 
discovers and applies it to man. The authority of the 
apostles in the proclamation of the Gospel was vested 
in the name of the Son no less than in the name of the 
Father and of the Holy Ghost. The only way back 
to the Father's love is by Him who declares Himself 
the way, the truth and the life. 

Christianity is sustained by what it is, as well as by 
what it does. What we claim is that the unanswerable 
proof of Christ's divinity is Christ. Nor is this an im- 
ported divinity, the result of an upward evolution of 
character. It is part of Himself, existing in Him from 
the beginning, involved in the very fact of the Incarna- 
tion : the form was laid aside, but the fact was retained 
and manifested in an unusual miraculous manner, so 
that from first to last, we have in Jesus, God manifest 
in the fleshy Immanuel, God with us. Without this, we 
have an imperfect Christ, only a Christ through whom 
the Divine influence works as His moral being aspires 
in that direction, — only such a Christ as we may see in 
others, but no absolute, independent manifestation of 
God : certainly no such Christ as John describes when 
he says, He that cometh from heaven is above all. He 
whom God hath sent speaketh the words of God : for 
God give th not the Spirit by measure unto Him. What 
the world needs is a Christ without possibility of im- 
perfection, and without repetition. He is indeed our 



102 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

model as well as Saviour; but' no man is, no man can 
be, His equal. He is not the symbol, not the mere 
representative of the Divine presence. He is that pres- 
ence made known to men. He is at once the fulfill- 
ment and completion of God's revelation. Through 
Him God not only comes to man, but saves him. 
There is one God and one Mediator between God and 
men, even Jesus Christ the righteous. In the beautiful 
words of the catechism, " I believe that Jesus Christ, 
true God, begotten of the Father from eternity, and 
also true man, born of the virgin Mary, is my Lord!' 

In all time this has been the faith of the Church, one 
of its clearest and most masterly apostolic distinctions. 
Let us begin w T ith Peter. Surely if ever he was inspired 
it was when in answer to his Lord's question he said, 
Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. Sublime 
confession ! Our Lord Himself put upon this noble testi- 
mony the seal of divinity, and said, Blessed art thou , 
Simon Bar-jona : for flesh and blood hath not revealed 
it unto thee y but my Father which is in heaven. Matt, 
xvi. 13-17. Think of such a verdict being pronounced 
upon any best man that ever lived. The saintly Paul, 
the loving John, would have rejected it as blasphemy; 
but it does belong to Jesus Christ, and it belonged to 
His mission to recognize the claim. 

In the epistle of Clement of Rome, written at the close 
of the first or early in the second century, he calls 
Christ " the sceptre of the Divine Majesty." In one of 
the epistles of Ignatius, of the second century, such ex- 
pressions as these occur:— " the love of Jesus Christ 



THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. IO3 

our God," "the blood of God." From the epistle of 
Diognetus these words are taken, — "As a king sends 
his royal son, so did God send Him to us as God." 
This testimony began with the uplifted cross, and by 
friends and foes it has been kept in the air ever since. 
The voice that spoke out of the sky at His baptism fills 
the world to-day. Even Pliny, born in the year 62, a 
learned pagan, speaking of the Christians, says, " They 
sing hymns to Jesus as God." The first Council of 
Nice vindicated the divinity of Christ against Arius ; 
and from Pentecost until now, wherever the gospel has. 
been preached, this truth has been clearly manifest im 
its power and effects. This doctrine is no new inven- 
tion of orthodoxy : it came with Jesus, and has been* 
the glory of the Church ever since. The witness of/ 
history confirms the divinity of our Lord. 

All along, the Church has stood stoutly for this , 
mighty truth. Her ministers have preached it, her 
martyrs have died for it, and to-day her children in ev- 
ery land get impulse and joy from it. To give it up , 
would be to repeat the scene of the thorny crown, and ■ 
to surrender all. "Springing originally," says Prof.,. 
Godet, " from the consciousness of Jesus, the affirma- 
tion of His divinity was repeated by the apostles, re- 
produced by the doctors of the Church, embodied in 
the hymns of the whole Church, in the midst of the 
fires of persecution and martyrdom ; and this testimony 
of Jesus is re-echoed to us to this day, reaching us from 
all the voices of Christian antiquity, to confirm us in 
our faith, and to make us conquerors in the great cri- 



104 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

sis into which we are about to enter." With what 
majesty of confidence may we not exclaim, Who is he 
that overcometh the world, but he that confesseth that 
Jesus is the Son of God? 

The question of the union of the two natures in 
Christ is indeed a profound mystery, but it is no argu- 
ment against the fact. I am not the least embarrassed 
because I cannot explain this marvellous conjunction. 
Indeed, the mystery is itself some testimony to the 
doctrine. It is not to be expected that God should so 
manifest Himself to our finite understanding, without 
overreaching our limited comprehension. How the 
Father and the Son are one ; how it is that all power in 
heaven and in earth is His who was born of a woman 
and knew the helplessness of a child; how He could 
say, Before Abraham was, I am, and then add, Of that 
day and that hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels 
which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father ; in 
what particular relation He stood, or to what office or 
function He referred when He by whom the worlds 
were made said, My Father is greater than I ; how He 
who was with God and was God, could come into the 
world as a helpless infant, and live the natural life of a 
man for three and thirty years — these are God's own 
secrets. I do not pretend to fathom them. Still, just 
what they have brought me meets my profoundest 
wants, and provides me with a new and blessed life, ra- 
diant with an everlasting hope. I do not lament that 
I am baffled here ; I rather rejoice in it. Faith and 
the spiritual vision enable me to see in this mystery 



THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. IO5 

the mastery and glory of the Christian Religion. 
Christianity cannot be without it. We cannot have a 
God without " unfathomable realities; " we cannot have 
a divine redeeming religion without mystery. I can 
no more reject this great truth because of mystery, 
than I can reject the truth of a self-existent God, so 
strangely interwoven with all I see about me. My 
finite comprehension is constantly baffled when I turn 
my thought upon God anywhere. Who by searching 
can find out tJie Almighty ? The fact of sin is as plain 
as the shining stars, yet who can comprehend its ex- 
istence and dread work in this world? The fact of the 
Incarnation is just as real. It fits into and is an essen- 
tial part of God's great plan, but a complete knowledge 
of it is too high for the finite. — Great is the mystery of 
godliness. 

Suppose we say that Christ was only a man : is not 
the mystery in that case increased? How shall we ac- 
count for Him, and preserve the order and teaching of 
God's word ? Is not the burden of testimony on the 
other side ? Is not the denial of Chrises divinity the 
blow that demolishes the majestic citadel of Christian- 
ity ? Can we give up the mystery without giving up all ? 
M. de Pressense is right when he says, " If Arianism 
had won the victory, there would have been an end of 
Christianity." What this world needed was a Saviour 
who should come down from God out of heaven, — who 
should proceed from the Godhead, " very God of very 
God/' combining in Himself the sovereignty of Deity, 
and the sympathies of a man, and just such a Saviour 



106 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

was sent. Who but God manifest in the flesh could be 
equal to this? Is it strange, then, that in His condi- 
tion of voluntary humility, His speech should partake 
of His wonderful condescension, and that He should 
declare an unconsciousness for a time of the purpose 
of the Father, or that He should give utterance to a 
dependence upon the illimitable Deity out of whose 
glory He came to die for a lost world? Did He talk 
and act like a man? — still more He spoke and wrought 
as a God. This not only seems to be essential, but to 
the devout, believing heart, it is that in God's gracious 
interposition which challenges gratitude and kindles 
joy. Small are the difficulties in the way in receiving 
Jesus Christ as the sent of God, as God Himself, com- 
pared with those which beset us if we only receive Him 
as a man. Of course, if we set aside the Word of God, 
the difficulty vanishes — and so do faith and salvation. 
On the other hand, the mystery becomes to faith a holy 
inspiration ; its fruit, in experience and life, confirms its 
truth, and the soul advances in holiness as it looks into 
the Redeemer's face and exclaims, In Him dwelleth all 
the fulness of the Godhead bodily. 

Turning now to what we believe is unanswerable 
testimony to the divinity of Jesus Christ, we shall base 
the argument upon two facts, first, His character, and 
secondly, His words. To the latter we shall add ad- 
ditional testimony from the inspired Word. 

First, then, let us consider the character of Jesus 
Christ. That He was singular, without any parallel in 
the excellences which adorned His person and life, it is 



THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. 107 

easy to admit and impossible to deny — many of His foes 
grant as much; but was He superior in such a sense 
as to render repetition among men impossible, and to 
make the higher attribute of divinity the only satisfac- 
tory solution of His perfect humanity? Was He in- 
deed absolutely perfect? Under all circumstances did 
He maintain that perfection, and in the crisis moments 
of His life, did He illustrate not only a sinless character, 
but a sovereignty of being which fully warranted the 
claim He made for Himself that He was the Son of 
God and equal with Him? If these questions are not 
susceptible of an affirmative answer, then His superior 
goodness only excels that of many others in degree 
and not in kind, and the claim of a " complete divinity" 
enshrined in a complete humanity — the tabernacle of 
God among men — falls to the ground. In that event 
we should be forced to the conclusion that He was 
simply made the depository of a larger amount of the 
Divine influence, because He had the capacity to receive 
such unusual fulness of benediction. Does not this 
conclusion still leave the humanity of Christ in mystery, 
and carry us beyond any necessity for Him except as 
a model to imitate or even emulate? Then, "we are 
called to live like, not by Him." The Jew is right — 
we are yet without an atoning Saviour. To imitate 
this man will do: to trust Him as more than a man is 
a delusion, — to worship Him as Lord is profane idol- 
atry. But if these questions can be answered in the 
affirmative, then Jesus Christ differs widely from those 
to whom He came, not only in the degree but in the 



108 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

quality of His excellence. Then He is the Son of 
Man because He is also a Son of God : the world has 
an all-sufficient Saviour, and the joyous experience and 
hope of millions is not a mere sentiment, still less a de- 
lusion. God hath shined in our hearts, to give the light 
of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus 
Christ. 

But what are the facts? Sin is so common among 
men, it has become so thoroughly identified with hu- 
man character and life, that the moment we begin to 
consider the character and life of Christ, we are im- 
pressed with the marked disparity between Him and 
ourselves. Nor is it without significance that the ho- 
lier men become, the more do they observe and lament 
this difference. Undoubtedly Jesus Christ is the one 
sinless personality. His holiness is not partial: it is 
without spot or blemish. It is a singular fact that men 
in all ages, that His worst foes, have hesitated to charge 
any sin upon Christ ; they have instinctively shrunk 
back from too near an approach to His holy person ; 
and no insinuation of skeptics, no dark shadow of sus- 
picion they have ever attempted to cast upon His 
character, has failed to relieve the desperation and 
blushing groundlessness of the effort. Even Strauss 
says: "Among the personages to whom humanity 
owes the perfecting of its moral consciousness, Jesus 
occupies at any rate the foremost rank. He intro- 
duced into our ideal of good, some features which 
were wanting to it up to this time. By the religious 
tendency which He imprinted upon morality, He en- 






THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. IO9 

dowed it with a higher consecration; and by incarnat- 
ing goodness in His own person He communicated to 
it a living warmth. In regard to everything which 
concerns the love of God and our neighbor, to purity 
of heart and to the life of the individual man, nothing 
can be added to the moral intuition which has been 
bequeathed to us by Jesus Christ." This language is 
guarded ; it might be less conservative in some of its 
statements, and give a nobler emphasis to the truth ; but 
withal it is a testimony to the holiness of Christ that 
is significant, because wrung from the author by facts 
which make no contribution to his avowed purpose. 

Nothing is clearer than that our Lord had a pro- 
found consciousness of His own personal purity. 
Without any show of vanity, and without the least de- 
sire that any merely selfish end should be served by it, 
indeed at no little risk, He does not hesitate to appeal 
to the fact in the presence of His foes, and His ene- 
mies, if not willingly, are still frank enough to confirm 
His conviction. Never was there a harder task in this 
world than the fruitless attempt to find a blot upon the 
character, or the least stain on the name of Jesus. To 
those who reproached Him He said : Which of you con- 
vinceth me of sin ? — John viii. 46. Here they reached 
their limit. His enemies had now and again an op- 
portunity to assail Him, but they were always wanting 
in facts to make it available. When He approached 
the garden to drain the cup of His agony He said : — 
The prince of this world cotneth, and hath nothing in me. 
John xiv. 30. Pilate could find no fault in Him y while 



no 



VITAL QUESTIONS. 



the centurion and his companions were awed at the 
scene of the crucifixion, and fearing greatly, said: 
Truly this was the Son of God. — Matt, xxvii. 54. 

There is something irresistible in holiness ; there is 
a majesty in it before which evil in its most defiant and 
boastful attitude blushes away. Who has ever been 
able to stand against the sinless Christ? Strange sub- 
lime wonder is this we see ! One like us, and yet so 
unlike us in a profound consciousness of personal holi- 
ness, and yet never any consciousness of personal sin. 
He is, indeed, tempted — tempted in the wilderness, 
tempted when He was hungry, tempted in those 
methods and with those offers which have so mastered 
our humanity — and yet in every instance without sin. 
He prays, but never confesses any wrong. He w r eeps 
for others, but no tear of personal penitence ever falls 
from His unblushed cheek. The best among those 
whom He has saved, and who would die for Him, 
must often turn away to seek forgiveness in His name; 
but He needs no atoning blood, no interceding priest. 
He was holy, harmless, wide filed, separate from sinners, 
and made higher than the heavens. Aye, and cleaner 
too. He preached the new birth to Nicodemus, but 
He who was transfigured on the mount, needs no re- 
generation within; on the other hand, He makes it 
plain that it is only through Him that so holy a nature 
can come to others. Now, if Jesus be not holy in a 
sense not peculiar to, and never wholly illustrated by 
other men, then He must be a deceiver, or He is Him- 
self the most remarkable instance of self-deception the 



THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. Ill 

world has ever seen. As Godet puts it : " In presence 
of this unprecedented moral fact, we have but two 
alternatives open to us : either Jesus is in reality a per- 
fect saint, as His consciousness testifies, or else He is 
the blindest and most hardened of mankind, since His 
consciousness has not made Him aware of the most 
elementary fact of moral life — the fact of which every 
child is already inwardly aware, even before his atten- 
tion is drawn to it — the presence of sin in him." Be- 
tween these alternatives, the spiritually enlightened 
mind will have no difficulty to decide. 

This conviction is not only in harmony with our 
Lord's religious habit as contrasted with ours, but it 
is also in harmony with His mission. He did not 
come to gratify ambition, to indulge passion, to con- 
fess sin, or to correct blunders. He came equipped 
for His work, and left the world when He had finished 
it. What was His mission? Let Him speak it: — 
I am come that they might have life. — John x. 10. / 
came not to judge the world, but to save the world. — 
John xii. 47. For the Son of man is come to seek and 
to save that which was lost. — Luke xix. 10. If another 
shall speak it, it must be in words like these: — This is a 
faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ 
Jesus came into the world to save sinners. — iTim. i. 15. 

To the accomplishment of such a mission it is plain 
enough He only is equal who is holy as God, and 
equally identified with Him in His supreme purpose. 
The bare suspicion of sin, with any least ground for it 
to rest upon, would have wholly unfitted Jesus Christ 



112 



VITAL QUESTIONS. 



for every function of a Saviour. The efficacy of the 
atonement consists largely in the fact that He who 
died Himself did no sin, neither was guile found in 
His mouth. The best of the Lord's children, those in 
whom the spiritual faculty is greatest, are overwhelmed 
with this fact ; they shrink not from contact, but they 
shrink from any thought of equality with the Divine 
One. They lie down at His feet in conscious self- 
abasement, and if they may but touch the hem of His 
garment they feel the inflow of His love and life. His 
most intimate disciples when He was upon the earth 
felt and lamented their weakness in His presence; it 
is so now. Standing above its assoilment in every age, 
He rebukes the world's iniquity and unbelief. He 
looks compassionately into the penitent's tearful eye, 
forgives him, and bids him go and sin no more. 
Surely the world has never seen His like, and all He 
is, and has come to do, distinctly declare that it never 
will. Never will, because in the nature of the case 
there can only be one such as He. It is a distinction 
of Christianity alone that it has an Incarnation, and that 
through the human-divine Christ it offers salvation to 
a lost world. I am glad to produce this word of testi- 
mony from the writings of James Martineau. Speak- 
ing of Christ as the revelation of God, he says: "And 
this He achieved, in the only way in which we can 
conceive as practicable, by a new disclosure in His 
own person of all that is holy and God-like in charac- 
ter — startling the human soul with the sudden appari- 
tion of a being diviner far than it had yet beheld, and 



THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. II3 

lifting its faith at once into quite another and purer 
region. * * * And so Christ, standing in solitary- 
greatness and invested with unapproachable sanctity, 
opens at once the eye of conscience to perceive and 
know the pure and holy God, the Father that dwelt in 
Him so full of truth and grace. Him that rules in 
heaven we can in no wise believe to be less perfect than 
that which is most divine on earth ; of anything more 
perfect than the meek yet majestic Jesus, no heart can, 
ever dream. And accordingly, ever since he visited 
our earth with blessing, the soul of Christendom has 
worshiped a God resembling Him — a God of whom 
He was the image and impersonation. ,, Here is more 
than an ordinarily holy man, more than an example 
for our imitation; this is He of whom Moses and the 
prophets wrote, He who unhesitatingly says to every 
soul inquiring for the sinner's Saviour — I that speak 
unto thee am He. 

Think of such a Being coming into this sinful world, 
to find nothing in common, everything set against 
Him, as if He were an intruder — yet standing unsoiled 
above it all, meeting this hostility with a frank yet 
majestic gentleness; His very wounds, and agony, 
and death, overmastering it, and winning His foes over, 
to His side. From the beginning every trophy has 
been from among His foes. When malice has ex- 
hausted itself, He at once begins to draw all men unto 
Himself. How wonderful it is ! Who can compre- 
hend the strange and masterful forces that were en- 
shrined in that character and life! Who is He? 



114 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

What think ye of Christ? Surely He is more than one 
of the best of men. " He is the man — the absolutely 
good man — a man such as God alone could have con- 
ceived, and than whom He could not Himself have 
desired a better." This is the God-man, my Lord and 
Saviour, justly challenging my faith, my love, and my 
devoutest homage. Without this all His relations to 
the Father above, and to a lost race, are disturbed; 
Christianity is a tottering fabric built on sand, and 
Jesus Christ is discrowned not of divinity alone, but 
of manhood also. For as Dr. Parker correctly says : 
" If Christ is to command our confidence, He must 
continue to be what His claim to the prophetic past, 
and the alleged preternatural conditions of His incar- 
nation necessitate. A common man cannot be toler- 
ated after so uncommon a beginning. If He be only 
a young man of high and ambitious spirit, He has 
chosen a most perilous course, which must break down 
somewhere. It cannot be an easy task hypocritically 
to represent God upon the earth, without now and 
again letting the mask slip aside. How can the finite 
steadily carry the Infinite, where the Infinite is at war 
with Him? Christ must be more than a good man, or 
worse than the worst man. If he be not God, he is 
the enemy of God." 

" If Christ, as thou affirmest, be of man, 
Mere man — the first and best, but nothing more ; 
Account Him for reward of what He was, 
Now and forever wretchedest of all, 
Call Christ, then, the illimitable God, 
Or Lost." 



THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. II5 

There is no middle ground. It is not without sig- 
nificance that the noblest of earth, for whom Jesus has 
done so much, should bow before that matchless char- 
acter, and exclaim — Thou art the Christ, the Son of the 
living God. 

If Jesus Christ was a sinless — a perfectly holy being 
— we shall have no difficulty in reposing the largest 
confidence in His words. He not only lived holier 
than any one of His time or since, but He also spake 
as never man spake, He never had occasion to recall 
His words. A more than human emphasis, a wisdom 
that was supreme, a truthfulness that never could be 
gainsayed, and a purpose that was unsoiled of any 
least blot of selfishness or evil of any kind, always 
characterized His speech. The teaching of such a be- 
ing concerning His own origin and mission, cannot be 
without significance. He came into the world at im- 
mense disadvantage. He was without an influential 
following. It was necessary that He pronounce the 
vast pretensions which He claimed for Himself, and 
He did it, not boastfully, but with an authority in 
keeping with all He was and came to do. It became 
Him to speak not as one who had come to deliver the 
message of another, but as one who. was supreme. 
He dared to utter Himself in the first person, because 
He was Himself the source and purpose of what was 
spoken. It was not vanity in Him so to speak, any 
more than it is vain for a father so to address his little 
child. His tone was sovereign because He was Him- 
self supreme. To speak an untruth or a blundering 



Il6 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

word was neither a necessity nor a possibility with 
Him. How could He who is Himself the truth falsify, 
or give utterance to thoughtless speech ? We need 
not enter upon this investigation with any shadow of 
doubt. Jesus Christ is Himself the confirmation of 
His own words. Though I bear record of myself ] yet 
my record is trite : for I know whence I came y and 
whither I go. — John viii. 14. If what He says about 
His divinity be not true, then His word everywhere 
falls to the ground, and we cannot resist the awful 
thought that we are dealing with an impostor. Then, 
too, we must take for our companions the worst men 
in the world, for this is the charge they make. Then, 
too, the sepulchre has deceived us, and the infidel has 
not gone there in search of the dead body in vain, it 
is actually there, and in that mocking dust the best 
hope of the world lies buried. Blessed be God, the 
believer is put to no such extremity ! The resurrec- 
tion is a clearly demonstrated fact. He was no im- 
postor who left the grave's dominion, not His dust 
within its chilly bosom, and now who will venture to 
gainsay His word? The Pharisees were much per- 
plexed, as skeptics are to-day, with the words as well 
as with the works of Christ With a heated prejudice 
against Him, they said to the blind man whose eyes 
He had opened — What say est thou of Him, that He 
hath opened thine eyes? The healed man answered — 
He is a prophet. Subsequently Jesus said to Him — 
Dost thou believe in the Son of God? His recognition 
as a prophet was well, but not sufficient. The restored 



THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. 117 

man answered — Who is He y that I might believe on 
Him? Now mark our Lord's reply — Thou hast both 
seen Him and it is He that talketh with thee. Then 
came the full confession and the becoming homage 
— Lord I believe. And he worshiped Him. — John ix. 
l 7 7 > 37 y 38. Our Lord assumes the title not of a Son 
of God, but of the Son of God, and in no element of 
His character nor act of His life does He ever fail to 
sustain it. His pretensions were vast, but when did 
He ever degrade or fail to confirm them ? Was He the 
Son of man? so was He the Son of God. This latter 
title He claimed in a preeminent sense. When He 
affirms it, it is with the profoundest conviction of His 
right to it. He speaks with the consciousness of a 
sovereignty that no mere man may take to himself, 
and that no man has been able to gainsay. 

Some regard this bold title as referring to a subor- 
dinate position. It is equivalent, we are told, to the 
title King of Israel. Godet shows the absurdity of the 
substitution thus: Go ye and baptize all nations in the 
name of the Father, and of the King of Israel, and of 
the Holy Ghost. How does that sound ? Take another 
passage : No man knoweth the King of Israel, but the 
Father ; neither knoweth any man the Father, but the 
King of Israel, and He to whom the King of Israel will 
reveal Him. Our common sense, to say nothing of a 
becoming reverence, is shocked at such violent break- 
ing up of the unity between the Father and the Son. 

This title which our Lord assumes and so boldly 
announces,, not only indicates His relation to the 



n8 



VITAL QUESTIONS. 



Father, but His Divine nature and His Divine mission 
to a lost world. The title " King of Israel" refers ex- 
clusively to relationship, and no more. The Son of 
God is the inclusive title, the expression of oneness 
with the Godhead. It was this title that brought Him 
under the charge of blasphemy. His enemies under- 
stood it correctly, when they claimed that He assumed 
functions which did not belong to Him, and for which 
the law demanded He should be punished. Before the 
tribunal of judgment He maintained the title as else- 
where. If it was wrong, if it was meant to be understood 
in another sense, than as indicative of His divinity, 
why did He not explain it, and so shield Himself from 
peril? Clearly He could not, did not deny Himself. 
The whole life behind Him was beautiful with convin- 
cing evidence, that He was really what He claimed to 
be, the Divine Son of God. But our Lord made other 
claims which would have been preposterous had He 
not been all the title " Son of God" implies. Who but 
He may come between the most sacred human rela- 
tions and use words like these ? He that loveth father 
or mother more than me, is not ivorthy of me ; and he 
that loveth son or daughter more than me is ?iot ivorthy 
of me. — Matt. x. 37. Was He not so divinely great, 
that supreme love to Him is purest and truest love to 
those dearest and nearest to us? God only can come 
between ourselves and those who are bone of our bone 
and flesh of our flesh, and in so doing make us truest 
to our kin and kind. Jesus does not hesitate to ask 
us to love Him above all. He enjoins it and bids us 



THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. I 1 9 

repose in Him our everlasting hope. When He 
comes to comfort His disciples He says — Believe also 
in me. When He speaks to the penitent, He points 
to His own Cross, and says — He that believeth shall 
7iot perish , but have everlasting life. When the weary 
and care-worn lean toward Him, He says — Come unto 
me y all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will 
give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me ; 
for I am meek and lowly in heart ; and ye shall find 
rest unto your soids. — Matt. xi. 28, 29. 

Do such words become the lips of any other than the 
Son of God ? Have not souls found comfort, and help, 
and salvation, when they have touched Him, and is not 
trust in and obedience to Him the certain condition 
of communion with God? Constantly He affirms that 
faith in Himself is the condition of salvation, and that 
who looks on Him sees the Father also. He declares 
that the condemnation of unbelieving men consists in 
their rejection of Him, and that when the throne is set, 
it is His voice that shall pronounce the unchanging 
decisions of judgment — Come ye blessed. Depart ye 
cursed. Think of a mere man so addressing his fellows, 
under circumstances that would transform presump- 
tion and trifling into the most shocking blasphemy. 
I can understand how the holy, sovereign God-man, 
can speak thus ; but I cannot comprehend how any 
mere man, no matter what his moral or spiritual at- 
tainments, may venture upon such awful prerogatives. 
No matter where we turn to listen, the tone is more 
than human, the language more than man's. What 



120 



VITAL QUESTIONS. 



infatuation what arrogance, what mocking presump- 
tion, for any saint of earth to use words like these — 
All power is given tmto me in heaven and on earth. 
Believe me, that I am in the Father and the Father in 
me. He that hath seen me hath seen the Father. I and 
my Father are one. The Father hath committed all 
judgment unto the Son. I am the Light of the world. 
If ye shall ask a7iy thing in my name I will do it. As 
the Father knoweth me so know I the Father. Thy sins 
are forgiven thee. I am the resurrection and the life. 
No man taketh my life from me ; I have power to lay it 
down, and I have power to take it again. No man hath 
ascended up to heaven but He that came down from 
heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven. Be- 
fore Abraham was, I am. And now Father, glorify 
thou me with thine own self, with the glory which I had 
with thee before the world was. It is only by a desper- 
ate feat of exegesis, a violation of every law of interpre- 
tation, that any of these Scriptures have been twisted 
into the support of the humanitarian or Arian theory. 
To undertake a refutation of these false interpretations 
in detail would be labor lost. As long as the hearts 
of men are wrong respecting Jesus Christ and His mis- 
sion to this lost world, they will continue to strip Him 
of every mightiest function of a Saviour. I cannot 
wonder that free-tfiinkers who have desired to main- 
tain some conscience for truth, have had so much dif- 
ficulty to reconcile the words, and indeed the entire 
person of Christ, with their theory. It is apparent that 
ihe effort must be attended with an amount of perplex- 



THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. 



121 



ity which no genius nor ingenuity of man can over- 
come. To contend against God is always a difficult 
and certainly a hopeless task. At least, if the testi- 
mony of Jesus Christ is at all comprehensible to men, 
if it may be relied upon as true, then, clearly and un- 
mistakably, does it witness to His complete divinity. 

The same thought and tone are maintained through- 
out the New Testament. If the Apostles believed in 
anything with mastery of conviction, it was in the 
divinity of Him whom they preached as the Saviour 
of sinners. On the day of Pentecost He was boldly 
proclaimed as both "Lord and Christ," men were 
commanded to repent and be baptized in His name, 
the resurrection was set forth with an emphasis that 
baffled all contradiction, and the wonderful and blessed 
result was God's additional seal to the truth spoken. 
These witnesses finally gave way to others, but the 
testimony then, as now with evangelical aggressive 
Christianity, was the same. To the Colossians the 
Apostle speaks of Christ as the image of the invisible 
God, the first born of every creature: For by Him were all 
tilings created, that are in heaven, and that are in earth, 
visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or domin- 
ions or principalities, or powers ; all things were credted 
by Him and for Him. And He is before all things, 
and by Him all things consist. — Col. i. 15-17. What 
majesty of dominion, what limitless sovereignty is here 
given to Jesus Christ. The Holy Ghost summons all 
w r orlds, all highest intelligences in them, to crown Him 
Lord of all. Who among men will venture to pluck 



122 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

that rightful and essential diadem from His brow? 
Turn to that remarkable passage in Paul's letter to the 
Philippians — Let this mind be in you which tvas also in 
Christ Jesus ; who being in the form of God, thought 
it not robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself 
of no reputation, and took upon Him the form of a serv- 
ant, and was made in the likeness of men. — Phil. ii. 5-7. 
He was then, in the form of God, and made Himself 
of no reputation; He took upon Himself the form of a 
servant, and was made in the likeness of men. If this 
language does not teach that Christ had an existence 
before He came to be the world's Saviour, that He 
was equal with God, and that he assumed in a mirac- 
ulous manner our nature — if it does not mean that His 
humanity was not the beginning of His life but an 
event in it, not a life that came and then vanished in 
the ordinary way, but a great purpose of God that 
originated in the counsels of eternity before the founda- 
tion of the world, and will continue when the heavens 
are rolled together as a scroll — then, we may well ask, 
what does it mean ? Aside from the supreme divinity 
of Jesus Christ, and the great purpose of the Godhead, 
let him explain it who can. If it be claimed that this 
Scripture is only meant to teach the entire absence of 
self in Christ, and that we are to strive after the same 
mind, I answer that all this is but the bright glory that 
dazzles the crown of Him who came down from God 
out of heaven, to show us such unearthly perfection. 
We shall never attain to such excellence by looking at 
the life of a man, but into the face of God. Thus we 



THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. 1 23 

might continue until amid the sublime scenes and 
thundering choral of the apocalypse, we should hear 
one voice, sweet and distinct above all, saying — I am 
the Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, 
saith the Lord, which is and was, and which is to come, 
the Almighty. — Rev. i. 8. 

Whatever may be said to the contrary, it is plain 
that the uniform testimony of the Scriptures is on the 
side of the proper divinity of our Lord. I candidly 
believe that to deny this truth, is to destroy confidence 
in the Word of God, plunge the Christian system into 
a jumble of confusion, to surrender it to the foe, and 
to quench the best hope of the world. Blessed those 
who believe better, and have the witness within that 
what they believe is true. There are enough now, as 
of old, whose aim it is to discrown the Son of God; 
rather let us contribute to His greater coronation, and 
as we adore, exclaim in the joy of loving trust — " Thou 
art the King of glory, O Christ ; Thou art the ever- 
lasting Son of the Father." 

There is still another test and proof of this great 
truth upon which we touch in closing. I refer to the 
manifest results of the doctrine in the aggressive work 
of the Church, and in individual Christian life. 

Truth must and does vindicate itself in Christian 
experience and living. Long enough has this truth 
been denied on the one hand, long enough has it been 
affirmed on the other, to furnish in the unmistakable 
results of either, a verdict for or against it. If Jesus 
Christ be not divine, the largest, most active, and 



124 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

I may surely say the most efficient portion of the 
Church, is not only greatly deluded, but very seriously 
at fault — not only wrong, but fundamentally and sin- 
fully so. But certainly no one at all familiar with the 
history of the orthodox and evangelical portion of the 
Church will venture to deny that God is with this peo- 
ple. From every quarter, especially from heathen 
lands, voices come loud and jubilant, bearing testi- 
mony to the grace and presence of Him who said to 
His disciples in the beginning — Go, and lo ! I am with 
you to the end of the world. It is unreasonable, indeed 
irreverent, to presume that God would allow the most 
spiritual and efficient portion of His Church to rest 
under a delusion for so many centuries, and still less 
is the thought to be tolerated for a moment that He 
would sanction with #His blessing that which is pro- 
motive of basest idolatry, of which we are guilty if 
Jesus Christ whom we adore as the trite God and eter- 
nal life, is only a man. The best experience and the 
holiest life, and the largest measure of success in the 
Christian world, furnish the complete contradiction to 
the charge that those who trust and worship Christ 
as God are idolaters. A great and growing blessing 
has always attended the hearty acceptance and worship 
of the human-divine Christ. A conviction, a revelation 
of truth comes with it, it is never without gracious 
benediction, and as an uplifting inspiration in the soul, 
it is of most real and untold worth. The tendency of 
this belief in sincere hearts has ever been towards the 
noblest service and highest perfection. Everywhere 



THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. 



125 



this faith adopted without reserve, and illustrated faith- 
fully, has always produced the most useful, happiest, 
holiest life; and no wonder, for while furnishing an ex- 
haustless source of new life to the soul, it keeps before 
men a being infinitely above them, on whom to gaze, 
in recognition of this truth, is to be changed into the 
same image. Think of the majesty of confidence and 
rest that comes to the soul, that sees God's face in the 
face of Jesus, that hears God's voice in His speech, 
and that feels girt about with the attributes of Jehovah 
in every promise that fell from the Master's lips. 

Was he a mere man on whom Paul fixed his eye, 
when he said — I can do all things through Christ which 
strengtlieneth me. I know whom I have believed. I 
am determined to know nothing among men save Jesus 
Christ and Him crucified? Who believes this truth 
has a faith that baffles doubt, and a hope that casts 
her anchor hard by the imperishable throne. What 
efficacy and joy it gives to the Holy Sacrament. It is 
not a gross superstition, neither is it a mere memorial ; 
it is communion with the God-man — a channel through 
which Christ's own blessed life flows into the soul. 
The largest measure of personal holiness is possible 
only with this exalted view of Christ. I believe it 
holds good that just in proportion as we come down 
from these high views, we become tolerant of sin and 
susceptible to doubt, and if attempting a religious life 
at all, we will feel the need of something to support 
the lack of spiritual influence and joy. In the full 
round Christ we have all. In Him we are complete. 



126 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

He is wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and re- 
demption. We are to be conformed to Him. We are 
to live in Him, by Him, and for Him. As one puts it 
well: "No man ever gave himself to God, independ- 
ently of the gift which God has made of Himself in 
Jesus Christ.' , Do not the words of our Lord confirm 
this assertion ? — / will not leave you comfortless, I will 
come to you. In that day ye shall know that I am in 
the Father, and ye in me, and I in you ; he that loveth 
me shall be loved of my Father, * * * and zve will 
come unto him, and make our abode with him. Because 
I live ye shall live also. Not the Father alone, but the 
Father and the Son, promise to come and dwell with 
us by the Holy Ghost, and then, and only then, shall 
we ourselves become the noble, liberated, and master- 
ful sons of God. Who speaks thus is more than a man, 
and who trusts Him abides in the shadow of the 
Almighty. 

Unquestionably it is true that evangelical aggressive 
religion, the religion that believes in the missionary 
spirit, and is alone successful in promoting it, the reli- 
gion that insures and best illustrates communion with 
God and growth in holiness, the religion that sings its 
way to duty and through self-denial, and steps ever to 
the music of eternal hope, is surely identified with the 
great truth of our Lord's divinity. That Jesus is the 
Alpha and the Omega, by whom and in whom God 
has revealed Himself, by whom He will judge all men, 
and administer the spiritual government of the race, is 
the firm rock of our Christian faith, the surest and 



THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. \2J 

noblest inspiration of the Christian Church, and to 
surrender it is to surrender all, and invite universal 
ruin. I heartily consent to the words of Godet, when 
he says : " From the moment in which the Church 
should give her consent to this lowering of the Person 
of her Head, would infallibly date the darkening of the 
revelation of God on earth, as well as the setting up 
again of the pride of man, a marked enfeeblement of 
the dread called forth in the conscience of man by sin, 
and, as it were, a vaporization of the sanctifying power 
of the Gospel ; and consequently a decline, in all re- 
spects, of the moral and religious influence of the 
Gospel upon society and the Church." From such a 
calamity we can only rescue men by preaching Jesus 
Christ as God manifest in the flesh — His own eternal 
Son, in all the triumphs of His grace hastening to the 
coronation of the King of kings and Lord of lords. 
Only as men come to know Jesus, to trust Him with- 
out limitation, to acknowledge Him as supreme, will 
this truth ripen into a holy and helpful experience. 
Then, not with less, but with a fuller test than Thomas 
craved, the enlightened soul looks into the Redeemer's 
face, and in an unfaltering conviction and adoring trust 
exclaims — My Lord and 7ny God ! 



CHAPTER VI. 

PROBATION AFTER DEATH. 

ONE of the most interesting and indeed startling 
developments of modern investigation in the at- 
tractive but perplexing field of Eschatology, or the 
doctrine of the last things, is the dogma of Probation 
after Death, or an opportunity to hear and accept or 
reject the Gospel in the future world. To us there 
seems to be a strange incongruity in presenting such 
a doctrine in this life at all, and still more in defending 
and preaching it as a proper part of the Gospel ; but 
as all this has been done, and as the fruit is already 
manifest, we are bound to bear testimony to what we 
believe to be the truth or untruth of it. This subject 
on either hand involves the most serious issues, and 
we come to it not unmindful of the embarrassments 
in the way, and as it certainly becomes us, with an 
humble desire not to be wise above what is written, 
but to witness frankly to what we believe, is truth, 
clear and distinct. 

A reverent spirit is favorable to the correct appre- 
hension of the mind of the Lord in His written word, 
and for this spirit I am sure the reader will join me in 
devoutest prayer as we proceed. With no other tem- 
per will any man be qualified to approach such a sub- 

(128) 



PROBATION AFTER DEATH. 1 29 

ject. Since the greatest learning of the age has 
arrayed itself in opposition to the testimony it is now 
proposed to present, I affirm my desire not to dictate 
nor to insist upon my conclusions with arbitrariness, 
but to present with modest frankness what to me is 
truth, in view of present light It is not strange that 
I should shrink from such an undertaking, when it is 
remembered that men alike eminent for their learning 
and piety have become the advocates of Probation 
after Death. It is a vital part of the creed of the so- 
called " New Theology" — and it is not for us to ques- 
tion either the learning or sincerity of those who feeL 
themselves called to defend it. With great pleasure: 
and profit we have often sat at their feet, and still hold, 
them in highest esteem; but men who are justly great_ 
cannot believe for the humblest, nor is there need they 
should; what is written is written for the learning of" 
the lowliest, and to these God often makes clear what : 
to human wisdom is very obscure. 

As certain able German divines, who rightly coitit 
mand the respect of the Christian world, have been t 
cited, on this side of the sea and on the other, as > 
unanswerable authority on the Probation theory, I. 
briefly present some statement of the subject as heldi 
by them, in their own words. The late Dr. Dorner 
of Berlin, in his System of Christian Doctrine, under 
the section on the Intermediate State, says — " The 
absoluteness of Christianity demands that no one be 
judged before Christianity has been made accessible 
and brought home to him. But this is not the case 
6* 



130 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

in this life with millions of human beings. Nay, even 
within the Church there are periods and circles, where 
the Gospel does not really approach men as that which 
it is. Moreover, those dying in childhood have not 
been able to decide personally for Christianity. * * * 
Christian grace is designed for human beings, not for 
inhabitants of earth. It is not said : He that hears 
not shall be damned; but: He that believes not. 
Jesus seeks the lost: lost are to be sought also in the 
kingdom of the dead. The opposite view leads to an 
absolute decree of rejection in reference to all who 
have died, and die as heathen, whereas Christian 
grace is universal." — Vol. 4, page 409. Farther on, 
in speaking of souls in the Intermediate State, he 
says — " For believers there is no longer any punish- 
ment, but growth, a further laying aside of defects, an 
invigoration through the greater nearness of the Lord, 
which they experience, and through the more lively 
hope of their consummation. But those not as yet 
believers, so far as they are not incorrigible, remain at 
first under training which has decision for Christ as 
its aim." — Page 411. "The Gospel will be brought 
decisively home to all who did not in this world come 
to a definite decision, and all who do not shut them- 
selves thereto will be saved." — Page 412. Substan- 
tially the same view, but with more careful discrimi- 
nation, is that presented by Earnest Sartorius in his 
Doctrine of Divine Love, published by the famous 
Clark firm of Edinburgh. He says — while the Scrip- 
tures forbid any hope for those who in this life had 



PROBATION AFTER DEATH. I3I 

Moses and the prophets, and have rejected grace and 
sinned against the Holy Ghost, yet they do " indeed 
leave room for hope for those who, like sinners before 
the Deluge, and the heathen at the present day, had 
the law of God written in their heart and transgressed 
it, but not having Moses and the prophets, i. e. Divine 
revelation, have not yet heard the Gospel, and are 
therefore guiltless of contemptuous unbelief of it, or of 
the sin against the Holy Spirit of grace and supplica- 
tion. They may, even beyond the valley of death, 
come in the next world to the knowledge of the truth 
(1 Tim. ii. 4), and receive grace through the proclama- 
tion and repentant acceptance of the Gospel." 

To sustain the ground he takes, like Dorner, he 
barely refers to the doubtful passage in 1 Peter iii, 9. 
After the most careful and impartial reading of the 
views of these two distinguished men, as well as the 
views of those who have employed their testimony, I 
own that considered alone they seem to contain much 
that is plausible; they appeal to our sympathy, and are 
apt to take us before we are aware of it ; but the more 
I have meditated upon them in their relation to the 
entire scheme of grace, so far as I can grasp it, my 
conviction has grown strong that we have in these 
views an illustration of a theology decidedly specula- 
tive and in every way perilous, and no more. If these 
views be correct, there is no orthodox system of the- 
ology, not excepting the most scriptural, that must 
not be reconstructed; and another spirit than that 
which we believe is the best counterpart of the Apos- 



132 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

tolic, and which has in all the ages vindicated itself by 
the fruit it has borne, must be introduced into the 
preaching of the Gospel. In my anxiety to know the 
truth, I have been disappointed in not finding in either 
of the works of these distinguished men, nor anywhere 

else, any positive Thus saith the Lord, in confirmation 

» 

of their views. 

"It seems so," is as far as they venture, which is 
not sufficiently positive to be dogmatic; and yet, it 
would seem that a view involving issues so vital and 
solemn, if it be truth, should be stated with the em- 
phasis of unanswerable conviction. Those who hold 
this view have an intimation, and upon this intimation 
is founded a conjecture — a conjecture in consonance 
with a humane feeling to which unbelief gives ready 
response, and which, without sanction as I believe, is 
in some part regarded as a standard of truth, if not a 
law of interpretation. Is it not a like humane feeling 
that leads some men to reject the atonement on the 
ground of cruelty to the Son of God ? I cannot be- 
lieve that such a view respecting the destiny of souls 
in the future should so much as be mentioned upon a 
mere intimation, still less set forward with the prestige 
of commanding names, and distinguished place and 
learning, as a dogma of belief. 

These views the reader will observe entirely ignore 
conscience, the law written in the heart, as any stand- 
ard of final judgment. Admit them, and it is difficult 
to see any purpose in the teaching of the Holy Ghost, 
as recorded in Rom. ii. 12-15 — As many as have sinned 



PROBATION AFTER DEATH. 1 33 

in the law shall be judged by the law * * *. For when 
the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the 
things contained in the law, these, having not the law, 
are a law unto themselves ; which shoiv the work of the 
law written in their hearts, their consciences also bearing 
witness, and their thoughts the meanwhile accusing or 
excusing one another. The Apostle maintains that the 
light of nature stood to heathen Gentiles in the place 
of a written law. Without the written law and by the 
light in and about them, they might even do what the 
law required, and so were a law unto themselves, were 
without excuse, and the Divine equity is vindicated. 
The rule of obedience, whatever that rule be, is the 
standard of judgment. If a man has nothing but con- 
science and the light of nature, if no more is available 
to him, for this much he is responsible, and with this 
much only some undoubtedly have come to fear God 
and work righteousness, and have been accepted of 
Him. They improved their probation. 

Again, Dr. Dorner clearly denies the salvation of 
infants by virtue of the atonement, and holds that even 
they must have presented to them an opportunity to 
accept or reject the Gospel, and be judged accordingly. 
This is in direct violation of the teaching of our Lord, 
who announces, with such tenderness and beauty, that 
the kingdom of heaven is both inhabited and illus- 
trated by these. These views, as I think, very much 
limit the really very wide function of the Holy Spirit, 
and disturb some of the fundamental conditions of the 
resurrection and the last judgment. 



134 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

The hour is coming, in the which all that are in the 
graves shall hear His voice \ and shall come forth, they 
that have done good (done good certainly in this life) 
unto the resurrection of life ; and they that have done 
evil (done evil certainly in this life), unto the resurrec- 
tion of damnation. — John v. 28, 29. 

According to the views of the advocates of this the- 
ory, there are hundreds and thousands in this enlight- 
ened land, who will say in the words of the eminent 
Dorner, that the Gospel has not " approached them as 
that which it really is," and that their opportunity has 
been entirely too limited for God to find any just 
ground of judgment against them, and this, perchance, 
whilst they are rejecting an overture of mercy which 
is as simple as it is adequate. Modify and circum- 
scribe this theory by whatever conditions its advocates 
please, the manifest fact remains, it destroys the force 
of Gospel appeal, it furnishes another and most effec- 
tual refuge to unbelief, men presume upon it, and the 
cause of evangelization is hindered. 

I have been surprised to notice this doctrine de- 
fended in one instance with characteristic eloquence 
and originality from these words — For the Son of Man 
is come to seek and to save that which is lost — language 
which has ever been regarded as setting forth a present 
Saviour, for a present necessity. He came to meet it, 
and the result of that coming is the consummation of 
Gospel grace in the world to come, but not its perpet- 
uation. The argument is built solely on the one word 
lost, and then the author says with a fine touch of 



PROBATION AFTER DEATH. 1 35 

pathos : " I regard that as a key-word. Some will 
say that the word ' lost' relates to man while he is in 
the body and upon the earth. But by what authority 
is such limitation attached to the word? * * * When 
Clirist said lost, who can tell how far His eye pene- 
trated the region that to man is invisible — how far He 
looked down the terrible chasm into which man had 
descended — what He saw in the darkness deeper than 
the gloom of the grave? * * * He tracks lost men 
down to the deepest and darkest cavern. Even devils 
could not shut their gate of flame upon Him. * * * 
My reading of the passages quoted from Peter's epistle 
brings me to the conclusion that between Christ's cru- 
cifixion and resurrection He went and preached to the 
spirits in prison, to them that are dead, to them who 
are in Hades, in the invisible state of the departed, 
and that He did this that they might be judged accord- 
ing to men in the flesh, but live according to God in the 
Spirit — in other words, that He might supply an evan- 
gelical basis of judgment, and an evangelical possi- 
bility of spiritual life." — Joseph Parker in " Hidden 
Springs," pages 117, 118, 120. I am sure it would be 
easy to respond to the views so eloquently presented 
by Dr. Parker, if any substantial proof had been pre- 
sented. But here again there is conjecture, and con- 
jecture only. The writing is good, but the argument 
is fanciful ; its strength is in its pathos and rhetoric. 
An unwarranted construction, as we think, is put upon 
the word "lost." This imaginary tax on the word 
" lost" would break the essential force of numerous 



I36 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

other Scriptures that might be presented here. This 
one for example — This is a faithful saying, and worthy 
of all acceptation , that Christ yesns came into the world 
to save sinners. — 1 Tim. i. 15. What world ', but the 
world He came into ? For this purpose He is the Lamb 
of God slain from the foundation of the world. Behold 
the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world. 
— John i. 29. And this is the condemnation, that light 
has come into the world y and men loved darkness rather 
than light, because their deeds were evil. — John iii. 19. 
If it be insisted that these Scriptures are not conclusive 
proof that Christ's offer of redemption is confined to 
this world, we are very sure, and only sure, that it is 
to this world the reference is made, and may claim 
that these passages more than offset the one quoted 
above by Dr. Parker, as sufficient to found an argu- 
ment for Probation after Death. But still more forci- 
ble, we find the final judgment indissolubly and par- 
ticularly identified with this life. For we must all ap- 
pear before the judgment seat of Christ ; that every one 
may receive the things done in his body, according to 
that he hath done, whether it be good or bad. — 2 Cor. v. 
10. Men are to be judged according to the deeds 
done in the body, in this body — not in the resurrection 
body. This is the probationary state, and with what 
light we have, or may have, w r e are to make the most 
of it. This is the trend of the Gospel, and of God's 
coming to men, from beginning to end. The appeal, 
the solemn urgency of Scripture truth, especially as 
it relates to personal salvation, is all on this side. 



PROBATION AFTER DEATH. I 37 

The entire scheme and method of the Gospel fit on the 
present order of things; undoubtedly they are for this 
world, for this lost world, and so well do they meet 
the case, that all the statement and inference of Scrip- 
ture that salvation is offered only here and now to 
men, get a most solemn emphasis. Betiveen its and 
you — between us and whom, if not between the one 
who was in Abraham's bosom, and the other one who 
was not ? — there is a great gulf fixed, so that they who 
would pass from hence to you cannot ; neither can they 
pass to us that would come from thence. — Luke xvi. 
26. It is hard to see the need of such a terrible reve- 
lation as this, if on that dark and cheerless deep, the 
music of the Gospel is to break until the shout of re- 
demption itself shall transform the black gloom of per- 
dition into the sinless beauty of heaven. How such 
an intimation must strike out the tone the Holy Ghost 
has put into such words as these — " Behold now is the 
accepted time ; behold now is the day of salvation/' — 
2 Cor. vi. 2. " It is appointed unto men once to die, 
but after this the judgment!' — Heb. ix. 27. Ye shall 
die in your sins. Whither I go ye cannot come .... 
I said, therefore, unto you, that .ye shall die in your 
sins ; for if ye believe not that I am He, ye shall die in 
your sins" — John viii. 21-24. / say unto you, my 
friends, Be not afraid of them that kill the body, and 
after that have no more that they can do. But I will 
forewarn you whom ye shall fear : Fear him which, af- 
ter that he hath killed, hath power to cast into hell; yea, 
I say unto you, Fear him. — Luke xii. 4, 5. 



I38 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

Of course human genius can easily find some other 
than the natural and generally accepted interpretation 
of the Scriptures I have quoted, in order to defend a 
view that demands the heat of controversy for its 
maintenance; but it is far better to fit ourselves to the 
truth, than it is to force the truth to do us service that 
some novel view may be defended. On such a theme 
it becomes us to speak in the Master's tone; with this 
and His own fidelity to this solemn truth, we shall not 
fail to honor the Gospel, and warn men. Those lips, 
that for tenderness and power, spake as never man 
spake, have given utterance on this solemn truth as 
no others ever have. From Him who came at infinite 
cost of love and life to save your soul and mine, I am 
taught that this world, where sin has done its dreadful 
work, is the place of redemption, not in the world to 
come — no, not in the world to come. When our 
Lord began to preach He said "repent" — the king- 
dom of heaven is at hand; and here, and now, the 
message He has given to His ministers for men is — 
Repent and believe the Gospel. The very form makes 
it imminent. God's faithful word gives not the least 
encouragement for delay, not even in this life, and for 
the world to come, as we believe, it has no message at 
all. Let us turn now to the single passage in the 
New Testament relied upon, for the most part, to 
sustain the doctrine of Probation after Death. In the 
Revised Version the reading is as follows — Because 
Christ also suffered for sins once y the righteous for the 
unrighteous, that He might bring us to God ; being put 



PROBATION AFTER DEATH, 



139 



to death in the flesh, but quickened in the spirit ; 
in which (spirit) also He zvent and preached unto the 
spirits in prison, which aforetime were disobedient ', when 
the long suffering of God waited in the days of Noah, 
while the ark was a preparing, wherein few, that is, 
eight souls, were saved through water. — 1 Peter iii. 18- 
21. It is not strange that I should hesitate to give 
any opinion on this confessedly difficult passage, since 
many of the wisest and holiest men of the Church have 
passed upon it in direct contradiction of each other. 
But in such a case mere individual opinion will not 
suffice. Let every one be fully persuaded in his own 
mind. An error is all the more dangerous, and re- 
quires the most careful scrutiny, if it has the sanction 
of great and good men. Did our Lord between His 
death and resurrection go and preach to the lost? 
Does this Scripture so teach, and is the doctrine 
of Probation after Death thereby established? Were 
these antediluvians, to whom God's servant proclaimed 
his warnings and made his appeals for one hundred 
and twenty years without avail, singled out, and did 
Jesus visit them after the roll of so many ages, and 
offer to them the benefits of His grace? If so, this 
Scripture affirms that the "spirit" here referred to, 
means the soul of Christ, and that this preaching was 
done between His death and resurrection. But neither 
of these facts are stated, nor, as I think, so much as 
implied in this language. By which spirit He went. 
What spirit? Evidently not the soul of our Lord, 
but the Spirit by which He was quickened, that is, the 



140 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

power of His divinity, as St. Paul has it in 2 Cor. xiii. 
4. Though He was crucified through weakness, yet He 
liveth by the power of God. Bishop Pearson, in quoting 
Peter's words to establish the pre-existence of Christ, 
says — "From which words it appeareth that Christ 
preached by the same spirit, by the virtue of which He 
was raised from the dead — but that spirit was not 
His soul, but something of a greater power of His 
Divinity." By the power of this spirit, he maintains 
that Christ preached to the antediluvians, through 
Noah, who is called a preacher of righteousness, just 
as He preached to the people of Jerusalem and Judea 
through the Apostles. The same view is held by 
other able and critical expounders of the New Testa- 
ment. Spirits in prison. — The particular spirits here 
mentioned were those who lived in Noah's time, who, 
unmindful of his warnings, perished in consequence, 
and at the time of this writing were spirits in prison, 
reserved unto final judgment. Christ did preach to 
these spirits in prison, but not when they were in 
prison — not between His death and resurrection, but at 
the time of their transgression and through His ser- 
vant Noah. This is the only view which to my mind 
preserves the harmony of the entire passage, from 
verse 14th to the close, and accords with the Apos- 
tle's purpose, which is " the enforcement of patience 
and steadfastness under calumny and persecution." 
In addition we might utter protest against the proba- 
tion theory as founded on this single Scripture, in the 
use of other passages from Peter's Epistles. Take 



PROBATION AFTER DEATH. 14] 

this one for example — God spared not the old world, 
btit saved Noah the eighth person , a preacher of righteous- 
ness, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly. 
The Lord knoweth hozv to deliver the godly out of temp- 
tations, and to reserve the unjust unto the day of judg- 
ment to be punished. — 2 Peter ii. 5,9. Is there not a 
solemn significance in this word — The Lord knoweth 
hozv. Is it not the answer, the only and the sufficient 
answer, to many questions propounded by the advo- 
cates of the probation theory which they do not, and we 
cannot solve? Is the language we have just quoted 
from Peter in the second Epistle, quite consistent 
with Peter in the first, according to the interpretation 
of the teachers of probation ? I think Joseph Cook is 
quite right when he asks — " What sense is there in 
such reasoning as this ? God spared not the ancient 
world while its inhabitants were on the earth, but sent 
Christ to preach to the spirits of the inhabitants of the 
ancient world after they had gone into the interme- 
diate state, and there caused them to be converted; 
therefore, the Lord knoweth how to keep the unright- 
eous under punishment unto the day of judgment!' It 
h another instance of the manner in which this theory 
of probation, when set over against the entire Gospel, 
is sure to jar its harmony with unseemly discord. I 
am frank to say, therefore, that I do not find enough 
in this Scripture to justify a definite statement that 
grace will be offered to souls and the saving methods 
of personal redemption continued in the world to come. 
In the language of the scholarly Lillie: "Of this I 



142 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

shall only say that, whilst a single clear testimony of 
Holy Writ suffices, with such as believe in its Divine 
inspiration, for the establishment of any fact or doc- 
trine, yet when of a single obscure passage two inter- 
pretations are possible, we shall do well to hold to 
that one which most easily coalesces with the general 
tenor of Scripture. And applying this view in the pres- 
ent case, we shall be confirmed, I think, in our prefer- 
ence of the first and ordinary view, as that has already 
been stated." 

To found such a dogma upon one or two generally 
acknowledged obscure passages is a venture which 
any man should hesitate to make, and, I will add, 
should fear to proclaim as a fact of the Gospel; and 
all the more when the view maintained so clearly 
crosses the unbroken current of Scripture truth. 

We might yet take a more philosophic view, and 
contend from the law of progress in character, by 
which evil men and seducers wax worse and worse, 
that it is difficult to see how spirits in the future world 
would incline to accept a light, to.which not a few of 
them at least closed their eyes here. Certainly the 
consolidation of character, so constantly illustrated 
among all conditions of men, is not favorable to this 
theory. If they hear not Moses and the prophets, 
neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the 
dead. — Luke xvi. 31. 

" Though God should stoop 
Inviting still, and send His only Son 
To offer grace in hell, the pride that first 
Refused would still refuse." 



PROBATION AFTER DEATH. 1 43 

I have ventured no opinion on the future of the 
heathen world. Those to whom these words are 
addressed do not claim to be of that class. The future 
of the heathen rather tends to quicken my personal 
responsibility, than to disturb my fears. I am certain 
they throw back out of their long black night a 
weighty obligation on those who look into the light, 
blazing at high noon ; and when I think of the thou- 
sands who have died without the light, I look into the 
face of our merciful God, and feel more than content 
to leave them in His hands. They will be judged, not 
by the light I have had, but by the light they have 
had. Who can limit the operation of the Holy Spirit, 
and who can deny that even among these there have 
been and now are those who work righteousness and 
are accepted with God ? For this much, and for my 
very best efforts to give thern the Gospel, the Scrip- 
tures give me warrant; but beyond this I read nothing. 
I believe a greater guilt lies at the door of the Church 
than rests upon the benighted souls of the heathen ; 
and we shall better illustrate the truth of God by 
increased devotion to the cause of missions, than by 
preaching a probation for them in the future world, 
which is at best but a conjecture — a conjecture essen- 
tially fatal to the missionary spirit and enterprise. 

There is one other passage brought forward to sus- 
tain the doctrine of probation, which I notice only be- 
cause in fairness it should not be passed by. In the 
Revised Version it reads thus — For unto this end was 
the Gospel preached even unto the dead, that they might 



144 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

be judged according to men in the flesh, but live accord- 
ing to God ill the spirit. — I Peter iv. 6. This obscure 
passage has been so variously interpreted, and its true 
meaning is still so much in doubt, that it is not so 
frequently referred to by the friends of probation as 
the one just examined. One of the ablest commen- 
tators says of it — "Of this extremely difficult verse 
there has been perhaps a score of different intepreta- 
tions. * * * It is a case in which many, after the 
best efforts to determine the exact meaning, have still 
confessed themselves to be at a loss. ,, He regards 
" the dead" referred to, as " the dead in trespasses and 
in sins — whether living before the incarnation or 
since." If this passage is not to contradict what we 
have quoted from Peter elsewhere — The Lord know eth 
how — it cannot be taken to prove a ministry of grace 
to those who have gone* out of the world. Have we 
any right to found such a dogma as probation after 
death, on a single passage whose meaning is yet hid- 
den among the secrets of the Almighty? Certainly 
not, if it be our purpose to lead souls aright, and to 
impart to them a clear view of, and an intelligent con- 
fidence in the truth of the Gospel. Manifestly the 
Gospel we have is for the living, for those here and 
now who are dead in trespasses and in sins — without 
God and without hope in the world. For these we 
are to be concerned, not about the departed. They 
have passed beyond our reach. Purgatory is not a 
doctrine of Protestantism. Just in proportion as faith 
in this theory of probation increases, will conscious- 



PROBATION AFTER DEATH. 1 45 

ness of a present need and a present opportunity, and 
confidence in a present Gospel diminish. 

From these statements the following observations 
seem to me to be clear : 

First. If there be a condition of probation after 
death, there is no adequate foundation for it in the 
Scriptures. 

A present salvation because of a present need is 
distinctly set forth. The opportunity of this day, of 
this present life with which Jesus Christ identified 
Himself, is tenderly and solemnly emphasized. Again 
and again men are warned against despising the light,., 
and assured that condemnation only can come of its. 
rejection. Jesus Himself speaks most frequently and 
alarmingly of the consequences of unforgiven sin in 
the future. He it was who wept over those who were 
resolved to brave the future without Him. What won- 
der that the advocates of this theory speak so timidly 
about it! The "new departure" is more written about 
than preached with the audible voice. Perhaps it is 
not less dangerous for that, in this time of active 
thought and wide reading. No man can preach this 
theory, and feel that he has the inspiration of God 
upon him while he is doing it. It is not what we are 
bidden to preach, and yet, if it be part of the Gospel 
of God, it should be preached, and that fearlessly and 
world wide. Think of a man standing up before men, 
guilty men hastening to the judgment of God, and pro- 
claiming a doctrine that involves all that is sacred for 
two worlds, without a positive conviction ; and yet 
7 



I46 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

positive conviction here is impossible; it is a conjec- 
ture; there is no clear Thus saith the Lord to sustain it. 
A recent writer on this subject, in the Homiletic Re- 
view, says : " Those who maintain the tenet of Proba- 
tion after Death, * * do not maintain that it is an 
explicit divine teaching." Then why teach it as re- 
ligious truth ? Such a dogma, instead of resting upon 
a single line or two of God's Word, so hard to be 
understood as not to admit of satisfactory interpreta- 
tion in all the ages, though the wisest and the best 
have grappled with it, should, it would seem, if true, 
be sustained by such ample and distinct testimony, 
that the wayfaring man though a fool might not err 
therein. 

Joseph Cook is right when he says : " The new de- 
parture is not found in the Gospels. The doctrine 
that there is opportunity for repentance after death did 
not proceed from the lips of Omniscience in the per- 
son of our Lord." And Dr. Gulliver is in my judg- 
ment right also, when taking a broader sweep, he 
adds : " The Bible contains, on any fair interpretation, 
not a suggestion, or a word, extending the offer of 
salvation beyond this world." I must not assume 
hastily to judge or dictate to others, but for me to 
believe or to proclaim the doctrine of Probation after 
Death, would be to make myself liable to the charge 
of being wise above what is written. God help us to 
be loyal to His holy word, and keep us from adding 
thereto, or taking therefrom ! 

Second. This theory has been advocated a sufficient 



PROBATION AFTER DEATH. 1 47 

length of time, to be judged by its practical results. It 
will be admitted that it has had great advantage. For 
while more readily welcomed by fallen human nature, 
it has also been defended by men alike renowned for 
their excellence and learning. But even good men are 
not infallible. Here, as we believe, some of them are 
in serious error. The practical test again comes in 
play. The tree is known by its fruit. I maintain that 
the influence of this doctrine upon the mind and char- 
acter of men, and upon the life of the Church, has not 
been such as to commend it as part of the Gospel of 
the grace of God. Its trend has not been to magnify 
general regard for the Gospel, with its plain and sim- 
ple conditions of salvation, but rather the reverse. It 
has quickened Universalism and confirmed its adher- 
ents, without adding avowed recruits to a faith, that 
has always lacked that self-testimony which belongs 
to that aggressive Christianity which counts the whole 
world lost, and seeks to bring it back to Christ, who 
claims the heathen for an inheritance and the utter- 
most parts of the earth for a possession. It has seri- 
ously affected the spiritual life of the Church wherever 
it has been preached and accepted as part of God's 
purpose in Christ. It has blunted the edge of those 
stirring appeals of the Gospel so effectual in the days 
of the Apostles, and with this, men's consciences have 
been quieted, and they have become more tolerant of 
the mighty sweep of evil indulgence which marks the 
time. There has been a perceptible loss in the sense 
of the guilt of sin, and the doctrine of probation is 



I48 VITAL QUESTIONS, 

largely responsible for it. I candidly believe that the 
wide-spread indifference to, and the unfounded security 
respecting the future, which characterize our time, are 
due in no small measure to this theory. It has swept 
over the land like a welcome breeze in summer time, 
and has been gladly accepted by skeptical and worldly 
minds. It has proved to be the "new thing," the 
additional pretext for which many have longed. It is 
not the Gospel that has produced or ever can pro- 
duce that conviction of sin which distinguished the 
day of Pentecost, and ever since has marked the best 
days of the Church. For a quarter of a century, be- 
ginning in high places, it has given decided color to 
much of the preaching in Germany, and its influence 
upon evangelical piety, as could only be expected, has 
been damaging. It is the general opinion of those 
who have had opportunity for proper test, that in 
Germany there is a marked, and to the spiritually- 
minded, a painful disparity between learning and 
piety. Of the former there is much, of the latter there 
is less. In churches and in individuals there are 
happy exceptions, and these are invariably found 
where the old evangelical Gospel is faithfully preached 
and as faithfully adhered to, but the general outlook 
fails to warrant such an impression. The distinction 
between the formalist, the unregenerate and the godly, 
is quite blotted out, and really devout, and spiritually- 
minded men find themselves at disadvantage often. 
Christlieb's spiritual life and evangelical faith are not 
evidently popular in his own land. He would have 



PROBATION AFTER DEATH. 1 49 

more adherents if he preached the " new theology" 
of which we are speaking, but with his greater num- 
ber of adherents in such a case, he would have less 
power. Joseph Cook quotes him as saying — " Preach- 
ing which makes no effective distinction between the 
regenerate and the unregenerate, Prof. Christlieb re- 
gards as the chief curse of the German State Church, 
and he speaks of it with spiritual horror, as flattering 
souls to perdition." If the influence of the probation 
theory in this country is not equally bad, it is because 
it has not been preached as generally. Its presenta- 
tion has rather been through the press than from the 
pulpit. It has not yet attained to such mastery of con- 
viction as to encourage bold avowal, nor has its chal- 
lenge failed of a response that need be misunderstood, 
or could be wholly disregarded. But it has already 
wrought harm enough to show of what spirit it is. 
That is not the Gospel, which has so effectually hindered 
the chief purpose of the Gospel in so many instances. 
It was hardly this doctrine Paul had in mind when he 
said — knowing therefore the terror of the Lord, we per- 
suade men. With this doctrine persuasion is at an 
end. The hearer laughs at it, and as for any terror 
engirding the sinner's condition, he will have a 
" chance," a " fair chance," to escape it in the future. 
Some will put off their salvation in any event ; give 
them to know, albeit you have no decided Scripture 
warrant for it, that they are to have an opportunity in 
the future, and then the evil of delay is settled. Who 
can estimate the harm even in this life of such a pre- 



150 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

sumption? It may be that these words will come to 
some one who is reposing in this false hope. Is it in 
your thought, my dear reader? — this new view of the 
"siren school/' will you risk all upon it? Is not that 
a fearful venture, when the very air about you seems 
to start the question — how do you know? Are you 
rejecting the ever-present Christ that is, for one you 
expect to find in the future — but how do you know ? 
On other infinitely less important questions you would 
not think of depending on an uncertainty, but here 
you are proposing to settle the greatest of all ques- 
tions in the future without a line from God's word, 
and you cannot answer when I ask — how do you 
know? Every step is carrying you toward eternity, and 
you are making no preparation, though God's mercy 
provides you ample means, you mean to wait on the 
after-probation, though from the solemn deep of your 
own soul, and out of the grave soon to receive you, 
comes the question — how do you know ? how do you 
know ? 

I am sure nothing could be farther from the wish 
or intention of many of those who advocate the doc- 
trine of probation — but what if this be the inevitable 
result of their teaching ? Is it wise to adopt and pub- 
lish a theory, involving such serious issues, without 
carefully considering its probable results ? Some who 
deplored the cruelties and horrors of the French Rev- 
olution, were nevertheless the authors of the principles 
out of which it leaped armed for the awful fray. So, 
here, there is no escaping the results of this unfounded 



PROBATION AFTER DEATH. 151 

doctrine. It is full of peril. Already the seed sown 
has borne fruit. That we are hasting into the future 
needs no argument of mine to prove. Only he is 
wise who prepares for it now. There is uncertainty 
enough in death. Let us not gird it round with the 
cheerless promise of an uncertain hope for the future. 

" Silent before us 
Veiled the dark portal, 
Goal of all mortal. 
Stars over us silent, 
Graves under us silent, 
Choose well, your choice 
Brief is, but endless." 

Third. It is possible that these words may come 
under the notice of some who preach the Gospel. 
Without assuming to dictate, I may venture to say to 
my brethren, that the demand of the times is not an 
uncertain but a positive Gospel. 

Be not thou ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, 
— 2 Tim. i. 8. In doctrine showing uncorruptness y 
gravity, sincerity, sound speech that camiot be condemned. 
— Titus ii. 7. 

These words find no illustration in the avowal of the 
probation theory. The Gospel is a statement of facts ; 
in the nature of the case it must be so, and as such it 
must be preached. The life of souls does not depend 
upon telling it in this way and that, but upon announ- 
cing it as an undoubted and authoritative revelation 
of God. All the more is it to be so stated because 
men are ready to resist such a Gospel. To modify it 



152 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

to their liking is to hush their slumber into the stupor 
of death. The victory of the Gospel is its mastery 
over resistance. It is not meant to yield to the de- 
mands of opposition and unbelief, but to meet and 
break them down. The probation theory is a "liberal" 
and accommodating doctrine. It is careful not to tell 
men that if they dash over Niagara they will perish — 
they will only suffer the inconvenience of an unex- 
pected bath. The Gospel must be stated with exact- 
ness, with the fire of conviction ; there is no occasion 
for doubtful utterance ; guess-work is not the preach- 
er's business ; he has to do with fact, with the positive 
truth of the Almighty. There is no occasion in the 
need of men, no room in the preacher's office or mis- 
sion, for the so-called " liberal view," of the " new 
departure." Confidence cannot be increased, souls 
are not saved, proper manhood is not developed, by 
the negative preaching which the probation theory 
encourages. When any man preaches so as to concil- 
iate unbelief, he has joined company with Peter, by the 
fire outside the door, and is declaring that he does 
not know the Lord ; with respect to the faith of the 
Gospel, he is " like the woman who kept the burglars 
out of the house by leaving all the valuables on the 
door-step." The present effort to displace the old the- 
ology, its glorious triumphs resounding in every age ; 
for the " new theology," rather the new philosophy, 
whether so meant or not, is the practical surrender of 
great truths that have been considered fundamental in 
the Gospel scheme, and are now and always have been 



PROBATION AFTER DEATH. 1 53 

confirmed by the " signs and wonders" with which 
God has attended their preaching. When men are 
awakened to their highest need, they always want a 
positive Gospel. No other Gospel will satisfy a hu- 
man soul. Its best yearnings call for this. The pro- 
bation theory does not provide it. It hangs the soul's 
destiny on a guess. It talks about a u chance," a 
" fair chance," on the other side, when we are only 
authorized to say that the door of salvation stands 
wide open to every advancing step on this. I know 
not who said it, but he said well who wrote this : " The 
people hunger for something positive. They want a 
faith of some sort that will support them in trial, 
strengthen them in temptation, help them in trouble, 
sweeten their joys, and span the dark passages of the 
future with a bow of everlasting hope. And only the 
preaching that comes from such faith, and builds up 
such a faith as this in the heart of the hearer, is fit for 
the Christian pulpit. In an age of latitudinarianism, 
and among indifferents, whoever believes anything 
thoroughly, and maintains his belief with his whole 
mind and might, is called dogmatic. But to be dog- 
matic under such circumstances is a great merit. Bet- 
ter be a zealot with a heart on fire with contagious 
enthusiasm for Christ, than a half-hearted expounder, 
raising more questions than can be answered, and 
starting inquiries in fruitless fields." 

The old-time preaching, whose tender, clear and 
stirring notes have come sounding down the ages 
from Pentecost, the preaching of Peter and Paul, of 



154 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

Luther and Wesley, still burns in the hearts, and is 
illustrated in the ministry of God's most successful 
servants; and through this positive and immediate 
Gospel alone are we yet to hear the acclaim of the 
final victory. For this lost world we are most certain 
we have a present Saviour, a present opportunity, and 
a present salvation. God save us from preaching an 
uncertainty instead ! 



CHAPTER VII. 
SOME CAUSES OF INFIDELITY, 

THAT there is a great shout of triumph in the 
camp of the unbelieving host to-day, is painfully 
distinct to all who have any regard for the honor of 
God, and the best life and hope of the race. The grief 
occasioned by such a boast arises not from any fear 
that Christianity is less stable in its foundations, nor 
less assured of ultimate triumph, but from the fact that 
from the large company of the hitherto indifferent, 
who might have otherwise been saved, the ranks of 
infidelity are being sensibly recruited. 

It is the peril that comes to human souls, and not 
any apprehension of the overthrow of the Christian 
faith, that makes infidelity a sad subject to contem- 
plate. 

It is indeed true that much of the infidel vaunting 
of our time is as superficial as the source whence it 
comes, and it is hailed by many not because they have 
been disturbed by any intellectual perplexity, or moved 
by any moral conviction, but from a strange disposi- 
tion among thoughtless people to glide with the rush 
of the popular current. Much of the infidelity now, 
like much religious profession, is a shallow pretense 
and no more. We are persuaded that under serious 
conditions of test, it would be found without defence 



I56 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

or approval in the minds and hearts of many who now 
feign to glory in the shame of it. 

Under the accumulation of thoughtless, worldly 
living, we think it quite safe to say, there lingers in 
many who show sympathy with unbelief a latent 
faith, which in their better moments demands recog- 
nition, and which in an extremity would carry them 
over to the side of God and truth. It is not easy for 
some souls to get away from the hallowed fragrance 
of godly homes, or the restraints of Christian example ; 
and not a few who have not shared so great a boon in 
early life, find it more difficult than is commonly sup- 
posed, to entirely obliterate the power of that general 
influence of Christianity which permeates the life of 
the nation as the air. A large per cent, of those whose 
testimony is nominally on the side of infidelity are 
actually better than their foolish boast would indicate ; 
and if the question be fairly put — " Would you not 
prefer to die a Christian rather than an infidel?" the 
number would at once be reduced to a minimum. This 
thought, while no warrant for an unfounded optimism 
on the one hand, will as certainly prevent an imag- 
inary hurtful pessimism on the other. Christianity 
is a long way from such a melancholy plight as 
Matthew Arnold, not its truest exponent by any 
means, would have us believe when he says — 

** The sea of Faith 
Was once too at the full ; and round Earth's shore 
Lay, like the folds of a bright girdle furled 
But now I only hear 
Its melancholy, long withdrawing roar." 



SOME CAUSES OF INFIDELITY. 1 57 

Aside, however, from these whose infidelity is more 
a pretense than a fact, there are still quite enough who 
are not only sailing in the unbeliever's craft, but they 
are giving it direction and destiny as it makes for the 
whirlpool below. There is abundant reason for great 
concern among believers, not so much for the cause 
despised, as for those who scorn its appeal. We mis- 
take when we break our hearts over the cause, and 
have nothing but words of censure for the offender. 
The permanence and triumph of our cause is assured, 
the everlasting ruin of the opposers of it is as immi- 
nent as it is inevitable, except they be rescued. It is 
this latter peril that should concern us most. To the 
writer, the saddest fact in connection with the present 
blushless boast of infidelity, is the large number of 
young men who have imbibed its principles and spirit, 
and unless they can be speedily turned from the error 
of their way, bid fair to commit to the nation the wreck 
and evil results of a blasted life. Taken with its false 
view of liberty, and its ready adaptation to all that is 
low in human nature, they fall an easy prey to its de- 
lusion, and when once secure under its galling, dis- 
honoring yoke, they are not easily reclaimed. In con- 
sequence of this, a growing number have ceased to 
frequent God's house ; restraints that were respected 
before are now thrown off, and not a few, alas ! have 
set themselves to do evil with greediness. Besides, I 
cannot but believe that Canon Curtis is correct when 
he says : - " It appears that great numbers of women 
nowadays are affected by unbelief; and many a life is 



I58 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

made restless and unhappy by the dissatisfaction which 
arises when such natural and congenial duties as those 
of teaching young children, visiting the poor, attend- 
ance at church, are thwarted by some interior cross- 
current of thought whispering doubt and self-suspicion 
of hypocrisy." I do not believe, as the author quoted 
seems to intimate, that the root of the evil is to be 
found in any mental perplexity about Christian belief: 
with the majority, at least, the evil is the poison-bloom 
of the wide-spread worldliness of our time, and in addi- 
tion, false views of woman's rights have contributed 
no little to this sad degeneracy. That much of the 
teaching on this subject has been avowedly subversive 
of the plain truth of God's word, is manifest to every 
candid and unbiased reader. By some (not all) of its 
advocates, Christianity, the Church, and her ministry, 
have been held up to derision, to the great delight of 
unbelievers. The evil consequences resulting from 
this unwomanly and un-Christian attitude toward that 
very system which above all others has lifted woman 
to her sublimest prerogatives and dignity, are sadly 
apparent. Alas ! for all that is sacred and beautiful in 
the home, and hopeful in the land, when Christian 
faith vanishes from the soul of woman! 

But there is another side in such an estimate as this, 
which it is but fair and most gratifying to consider. 
If the number of unbelievers among women has in- 
creased, or if the mastery of infidelity has become 
more manifest with the consent of these, it is equally 
true that our Christian faith never had such a corona- 



SOME CAUSES OF INFIDELITY. 1 59 

tion at the hands of woman, and in no age of the world 
did the Church of Christ so fully accord to her her 
rightful place, nor did she ever achieve so grandly for 
the spread of the Gospel. Among the noble, right- 
minded women of our land, God will never want for 
a witness. Mr. Brace is right when he says : " If, as 
often seems, a night of skepticism in America and Eu- 
rope is to descend upon the most generous minds 
among the men, woman will still keep lighted the 
torch of faith, and guide the race till the morning 
shines again to all." But here again there is ample 
reason to make us both thoughtful and prayerful : we 
must not shut our eyes to the most pernicious and fatal 
consequences of infidelity in that centre of the churches' 
and of the nation's hope — I mean the home. 

Nothing can be more lamentable than the increase 
of infidelity among those who are and have been 
ordained to be sovereign in the home. It is high 
time that the Christian training of children be more 
frequently enforced by the pulpit, and that parents 
come to feel that the instruction given in the Sunday- 
school is not, and can never be, a substitute for a godly 
example and parental Christian teaching in the home. 
The first altar is to be built by the hearthstone, and 
the priest and priestess who are to minister there are 
the father and the mother. Most beautiful ordination 
of God! Indifference or disobedience here is the 
violation of the command of God as distinct, and not 
less essential than the commission given to the dis- 
ciples, to go into all the world and preach the Gospel 



l60 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

to every creature. The home was God's first sanctu- 
ary, nor has He any more sacred now; and when 
Christian teachers and Christian parents everywhere 
lift it up to its royal eminence, very much will have 
been done to blot the ruinous shadow of infidelity 
from the hearth-stones it has cursed. 

In addition to all this it is evident that we are not 
living in a time when spiritual work is easy. Every 
active minister feels that there is an unusual amount 
of hindrances in the way. Organization and a variety 
of methods were never felt to be so necessary, and 
they never were so extensively employed, and yet 
with all these facilities, many of them excellent, it is 
not a large spiritual success which distinguishes the 
church to-day. This statement is not made as a 
reproach, nor as an evil prophecy, but as a fact which 
properly challenges attention. The church often re- 
sorts to methods which expose her weakness, rather 
than commend her wisdom; and it would be a long step 
in advance, a very prompt and effectual victory over 
her foes, could she come to realize more sensibly 
than she does that in all her great work, it is not by 
might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, saith the Lord. 
What we need now is not gloom, evil prophecy, and 
reckless fretting despair; these are but hasty steps 
toward the dominion of the very evil we deplore. 
Elijah did nothing for himself nor for the Lord's 
cause when he lay murmuring under the juniper tree. 
Our imperative demand is great wisdom, great frank- 
ness, a large compassion, an unfaltering loyalty to the 



SOME CAUSES OF INFIDELITY. l6l 

truth, a lofty consecration, an inspiring cheerful hope, 
and fidelity to Christian life and duty all round. 
That we may be prompted to these, let us study some 
of the causes of infidelity. 

Truth approaches men at immense disadvantage. 
They are naturally averse to it. We begin with a bias 
in favor of unbelief, and unguarded, the nature of man 
opens many doors to the inflow of error. In conse- 
quence many have espoused and have become advo- 
cates of infidelity from thoughtless choice. They never 
reason the case — for this they have neither relish 
nor capacity; they simply deny as if denial were, 
adequate testimony; they love their unholy profession,, 
and chiefly because it is unholy; it imposes no re- 
straint; it requires no moral condition; the drunkard 5 
need not give up his cup, the gambler can retain his 
vice, the libertine still persist ip his loathsome indul- 
gence. These willing, unreasonable infidels compose 
a pitiable class. Narrow, often degraded, they are 
proof against conviction, live only in their lower part, 
will wax worse and worse to the end, and though sadly, 
we must turn away from them and leave them to their 
folly. But all are not of this class. There is a better 
company, noble but misguided souls, worthy of our 
compassion, and he serves God and humanity who 
rescues one of them from the toils of the destroyer. 

But even these for the most part may find at least 
some good cause for their unbelief in their readiness 
to adopt it. How T many under the appeal of infidelity 
have set out to find confirmation for its pretense, in- 



1 62 . VITAL QUESTIONS. 

stead of testimony for the truth. Thousands have 
prejudged the case, and without any investigation 
worthy so serious a matter have plunged into the 
troubled sea, and are sweeping toward the rocks. 
Christianity, we claim, should be held by men because 
of adequate and reasonable testimony. If a man is 
given to doubt, he is not asked to take truth for 
granted. If he is prejudiced against the Scriptures, 
God has uttered an audible and an unmistakable voice, 
elsewhere than in the Bible, though it is difficult to 
believe that he who will not hear Him when He speaks 
by the Holy Ghost in the Word, will likely see or be 
able to read His distinct writing in the sublime history 
of Christianity. There is no reason, especially in our 
day, why a man- should adopt the Christian faith sim- 
ply because it was or is the faith of his mother, though 
there may be unanswerable testimony in that fact; nor 
any more should he feel it manly or quite intelligent 
to reject it, because some one in whom he confides has 
been pleased to do so, and perchance boasts the sad 
mastery of his feat. 

Too much is involved here to rely upon the simple 
avowal or habit of any one either way. If candid in- 
vestigation cannot fail to stiffen the faith of believers, 
we are very sure it would effect the conversion of many 
infidels. Let any man who is tempted to unbelief, 
whose mind is inquisitive and possibly disposed to 
skepticism, set about fairly and thoroughly to investi- 
gate for himself, and if his spirit be right the dawn of 
a brighter day will reward his effort. Christianity 



SOME CAUSES OF INFIDELITY. 1 63 

shrinks from no candid examination, and from no 
proper test. It demands it. Prove all things , holdfast 
that which is good. Men investigate elsewhere when 
vital interests are involved. Why not here ? It is es- 
pecially characteristic of our time in the spheres of bus- 
iness, politics, science and elsewhere. Why omit it in 
a matter of such grave importance as determining our 
personal relation to the Christian faith ? The fact is, 
there is nothing Christianity can starfd so well, and 
infidelity can endure so little, as thorough-going, hon- 
est investigation. Hence this is not the method of un- 
believers as a rule. For such candid dealing on this 
great theme, I am neither ungenerous nor untruthful 
when I say, they have neither time nor taste. When 
it is set over against this, that infidels are familiar with 
the Scriptures, that, as we sometimes hear, "they have 
the Bible on their tongues' end," I must dissent from 
the statement. I have never found such an unbeliever, 
and I am confident that even the exceptions to the 
rule are rare. Some of them are familiar with the ob- 
jections, with the seeming contradictions charged 
against the Holy Book ; but to say that they are familiar 
with the Scriptures in any fair and proper sense is a 
mistake. How many of them can repeat the fifty-third 
chapter of Isaiah, the twenty-third Psalm, the Ten 
Commandments, the Lord's Prayer, or any considera- 
ble part of the third, sixth and fourteenth chapters of 
John ? But suppose they were ever so familiar with 
the letter of the Word; familiarity is not equivalent to 
candid investigation and truthful conviction. The pro- 



164 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

fane man has tossed the holy name of God about until 
we feel that his familiarity is awful ; but does he know 
the name of God, and is he right on that account ? 

Here then, with young men especially, we have one 
cause of a hardening and confident unbelief. They 
have observed it set forth in the colors of a swagger- 
ing popularity, and adopted and boasted by compan- 
ions who were u hail fellows well met ;" and without 
thought, and with false views of personal freedom, they 
have embraced it, and started on their way of scorn 
for the Cross, which perchance saved the mother that 
bore them, and of contempt for the Holy Book which 
was her armory in the toil and battle of life, and her 
evangel of comfort when the sun went down on her 
last day. It is evident that those who have accepted 
infidelity without investigation must enter at once up- 
on the defensive. They have decided the case already, 
regardless of proof ; and if they investigate at all, it is 
not to determine the truth of their position, but to 
find support for it, and to gain adherents, and so they 
go on to produce in others the damage done to them- 
selves. 

As a rule men are ready and cautious in investi- 
gating everything that pertains to secular interest, but 
it is pitiable to see how slow and indifferent many are 
to examine into those great interests which involve all 
that is sacred in the present life and real in the life to 
come. It is an unfailing promise of God that who 
honestly desires and seeks light, shall find it; and it is 
just as true, the testimony of every unbeliever in the 



SOME CAUSES OF INFIDELITY. 1 65 

land, that he who leans unto his own understanding 
shall walk in darkness. 

I find additional cause for the infidelity of our time 
in the unfortunate and hurtful example of men who 
are credited with more than an ordinary amount of 
culture. These men compose a formidable array, and 
to not a few their position toward the Christian faith is 
staggering. Men observe them, read them, and then 
fall to trusting them. Not a few are unable to contest 
their ground, nor any more able to defend it; they 
simply conclude that such men must be correct. They 
reason thus : " Men of such learning, and withal of 
such external excellence, must be honest, and there- 
fore right." The argument to a superficial observer 
is plausible; but to one of more careful scrutiny, the 
fallacy of it is not far to find. They are men of 
science, of large reading, often of commanding posi- 
tion and of high social esteem. But their judgment 
on such a system as Christianity cannot be relied 
upon simply because of their intellectual qualifications. 
Worldly wisdom and utter lack of culture are alike 
powerless to furnish a correct verdict on the Christian 
faith. If unbelief is established simply on the ground 
that men who know much, or are supposed to know 
much, have adopted it then the men of learning, of 
extensive libraries, of influential place, and of unblem- 
ished character, on the side of Christianity, are all at 
fault. The claim is preposterous. It has no support 
either in history or experience. The Greeks were 
cultivated, and yet cursed with Paganism and sensu- 



1 66 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

ality. The Pharisees in many instances were strictly 
moral, but manifestly unchristian withal. Despite the 
excellences which commend some of this class, they 
are far from faultless in the protest they make 
against Christianity. Their sincerity is often shallow, 
and their internal spirit in wide contrast with their 
mere external behavior. 

Is not the sole purpose of literary and scientific men 
who have set out on a crusade against Christianity 
wrong? Is it found generally that they approach 
their work with the seriousness and reverence which 
the subject and its issues reasonably demand ? Are 
they not on the other hand self-confident, self-asser- 
tive, and without any regard for spiritual endowment? 
Is it not the aim invariably rather to achieve a victory 
than to ascertain and promote the truth ? Candidly, 
is not the overture of skeptics for the most part the 
coronation of selfishness ? These men uniformly treat 
truth as if it w r ere one of many philosophical schemes, 
a thing merely of the intellect, instead of a spirit to 
control, or a life to be lived. With all their knowl- 
edge, no element seems to have such mastery over 
them as their own blind prejudice. Their learning 
and their fair outward character undoubtedly give 
scope to their influence, and multiply the victims of 
their dreadful undoing, but to follow them on that ac- 
count is as unjust to one's self, as it is unfair to the faith 
they deny. How came they to be such champions of 
infidelity? Dr. Burr answers when he says — "They 
secretly disrelished essential religion itself; they ne- 



SOME CAUSES OF INFIDELITY. 1 67 

glected to carefully practise the truth so far as known ; 
they opened their ears freely to unbelieving specula- 
tions, without really investigating any; they never 
really went on the track of truth as the hunter does 
on the track of his game. They have never sought 
for religious wisdom as for silver, and dug for it as for 
hid treasures." 

They became adepts in that easiest thing to do, the 
raising of objections. Of purpose they put their 
sympathies on the side of the enemy. They made no 
single fair test of faith. Boasting loyalty to science, 
their entire attitude and method toward religion has 
been unscientific. Is it any wonder they became un- 
believers, and that in their show of learning they 
should aim to find what support they can for their 
views ? The wonder would be greater if such men 
were not infidels, and that as they receive the sym- 
pathy and flattery of others, if they did not become 
more self-assertive and boastful. Any frank and 
manly chance for the Christian faith must not be ex- 
pected from men who have commenced and continue 
with a strong bias against it. To follow these in such 
a matter, simply because of their learning, or their 
show of it, forgetting all the while their lack of co- 
operation in those great moral movements which aim 
to rescue, and in every way to improve the condition 
of mankind, is neither to do honor to one's intellect, 
nor to respect the great heart within, which constantly 
lifts man's brow toward the heavens and speaks for 
something better. The least, the most timid faith in 



1 68 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

God and truth, is better than unbelief buttressed about 
and dignified by all the mere respectability and learn- 
ing of the world. 

" Better is childhood's thoughtless trust 
Than manhood's daring scorn ; 
The fear that creeps along the dust 
Than doubt in hearts forlorn. 

"And knowledge, if it costs so dear, 
If such be reason's day, 
I'll lose the pearl without a tear, 
And grope my star-lit way. 

"And be the toils of wisdom cursed 
If such the meed we earn ; 
If freezing pride and doubt are nursed 
And faith forbid to burn." 

In noting the causes of infidelity, we must not over- 
look the fact that the Church is not free from respon- 
sibility in the matter. 

Let judgment here as elsewhere begin at the house 
of God. We gain immensely by frankness. The 
Church must not conceal her errors and mistakes. 
No shallow pretense of infallibility on the one hand, 
nor any plea of innocent ignorance on the other, can 
shield her from an open and regretful confession of 
her wrongs. The truth has nothing to hide, and noth- 
ing to fear ; it ever courts and always can endure the 
severest investigation. We cannot defy the testimony 
of history. The Protestant community cannot do it, 
still less can the Romish Church erase the pages that 
record her errors and wrongs. The verdict of unbe- 



SOME CAUSES OF INFIDELITY. 1 69 

lieving men on the blunders and failings of the Church 
is not always unfair ; their spirit and purpose may be 
seriously at fault, but that their strictures are now and 
again correct is undoubtedly true. To conceal or to 
explain these evils away is unbecoming the Church; 
to attempt to justify them is to falsify the truth and 
hinder its progress ; besides, such a course is wholly 
unnecessary, it is madness. To acknowledge, to de- 
plore, to correct these evils, is the demand of truth, 
it is the Church's tribute of honor to and faith in her 
Head, and the successful appeal for His blessing. I 
distinguish between the visible Church and Christian- 
ity ; no man is fair who does not. 

Christianity never made an infidel. The misrepre- 
sentation, the corruption of it, has made many. Bad 
men in the Church, by their hypocrisy and wickedness, 
and the Church in the hands of weak, mistaken men, 
controlled by prejudice rather than enlightened by 
grace, by her bigotry, intolerance, unseemly divisions 
and persecutions, has more than once turned herself 
into a recruiting agency, and helped to swell the army 
of unbelievers. In the day of judgment thousands will 
rise up and say to men who were great in the Church: 
" By your unchurching, anathematizing, imprisoning 
and burning those of a different way, you made us 
infidels." Or pointing to that man who clad in the 
livery of heaven strode boldly in the ways of dishon- 
esty and sin, to the misery of the poor and the mis- 
leading of the weak, they will say : " Your course 
compromised religion, made it appear to us an empty 



170 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

delusion, and under the power of your example, we re- 
nounced it forever." The dogmas of the Church may 
be true, her forms becoming and essential, but these 
alone have not always saved her from a serious protest 
against the truth, or from contributing to the brazen 
ranks of unbelief. History proves clearly that with 
these, not kindled by the Holy Ghost, she has some- 
times opened the flood-gates of infidelity. Is there not 
a solemn pertinence to our own time in these words of 
Christlieb : " It is a phenomenon that meets us in the 
earliest history of the Christian Church, that the out- 
break of heresies goes hand in hand with the loss of 
spiritual life in the Church at large ; that the rise of 
doubts has often coincided with the prevalence of fruit- 
less controversies. * * * What was it that in the 
last century prepared the way among ourselves for the 
prevalence of Rationalism ? Was it not the petrifica- 
tion of evangelical faith into the dry forms of a dead 
orthodoxy, accompanied by an almost total cessation 
of all further efforts for the diffusion of the Gospel? 
What was it but the cold, stiff morality, the absence 
of all spiritual life and fervor, and the hard, unsympa- 
thetic Deism of our preachers and theologians, which 
repelled ardent and poetic minds like Schiller. ,, Our 
case is not so bad as this ; never were more and grander 
efforts made to spread the Gospel than in this age ; but 
it must be remembered that the resources of the 
Church were never so abundant and excellent. Still 
there is much to lament, and she has need to gird her 
loins anew, to shake off the awful stupor of indiffer- 



SOME CAUSES OF INFIDELITY. I7I 

cnce, to expel the spirit of the world, and in not a few 
instances avow anew her loyalty to the glorious Gospel 
of the blessed God, 

The process of paring the Gospel down to suit the 
age, which has been going on in some quarters, has 
wrought untold harm. Ministers, college and semi- 
nary professors, who under the specious plea of " ad- 
vanced thought" have set about to furnish the world 
with an eliminated Gospel, have made no contribution 
to the worth and spread of evangelical faith, but if we 
may judge the tree by its fruit, the u new theology" is 
not well commended. The piety of the church and the 
rescue of souls have not increased under its influence; 
on the other hand, a blight has attended its march, 
while here and there on its way may be seen painful 
monuments of its terrible undoing. It is lamentable 
indeed when the responsible agents of the church, 
those in high places who guide her thinking and teach 
her young men, put weapons into the hands of her 
foes with which to beat out her own life. That our 
beloved Lutheran Church has been singularly pre- 
served from such hurtful disloyalty to the truth, is a 
mercy that may well challenge the devoutest gratitude 
of all who minister at her altars and worship in her 
sanctuaries. 

But even here the Church is not entirely without 
fault. May it not be that the novel, and as we think 
unscriptural views on the last things, such as proba- 
tion and limited future punishment, now advocated in 
some quarters and styled the " new theology," are in 



172 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

some part the manifestation of reaction caused by the 
unbecoming and sometimes revolting manner in which 
the awful fact of future punishment has been preached? 
That the fact is clearly and solemnly stated in God's 
Word, I firmly believe. Who keeps sin and carries it 
beyond, inherits a legacy of pain. 'Tis enough to 
state the fact. Let it be done. We shall not mistake 
by imitating our Lord's example in this matter. But 
let it be done in His tone and with His Spirit. To 
make such a theme an opportunity for the display of 
oratory, and the skill of descriptive power — to picture 
it to the imagination with unjustifiable literalness of 
heat and flame, as if the speaker had a real pleasure 
and were achieving a victory in his effort — is a viola- 
tion both of the letter and spirit of the truth; it is 
horrid, and we can only confess with sorrow that such 
preaching has made infidels. Remember, I do not 
say that this awful truth should not be preached : I 
believe it should, but never except with the greatest 
prudence and tenderness. 'Tis then we must feel that 
the love of Christ is shed abroad in our hearts by the 
Holy Ghost. And let us be content to state the fact 
— and that with bated breath. That the pendulum 
has swung too far in the reaction, I am confident. If 
the first evil, now happily well-nigh cured, has done 
harm, the second or so-called " liberal view," bids fair 
to outmatch it. It ill becomes any part of the Church 
to contribute to any of the popular forms of unbelief, 
but just as little so to present any truth of the Gospel 
as to hinder instead of encourage faith. 



SOME CAUSES OF INFIDELITY. 1 73 

That the Church has often been at fault in her treat- 
ment of men of science is also doubtless true ; she has 
not been as patient, as tolerant, as considerate, nor as 
compassionate as she should have been, and thus no 
doubt some sincere and inquiring minds have been 
driven into the toils of unbelief. The fault, however, 
in no case has been all on the side of the Church; the 
point now is that there is fault there, that it has 
wrought incalculable evil, and that among all the 
causes of infidelity, it is the most to be lamented, and 
the first the Church should seek to remove. Great, 
however, as these evils are, men are not exonerated 
from faith in God and the truth because of them ; they 
constitute a pretext for unbelief, but by no means fur- 
nish a sanction. The willing unbeliever is not shielded 
by the mistakes, errors, or sins of the Church, and is 
still without excuse. It is weak, and especially for- 
bidden, to follow false or mistaken leaders, wherever 
found. For this great evil there is but one remedy. 
It is the baptism of the Holy Ghost, For this and for 
all causes of infidelity, the faithful preaching of the 
Gospel, attended by the influences of the Spirit, fur- 
nishes the supreme corrective. 

May God awaken the Church to the great need, give 
wisdom and grace, and may her constant and univer- 
sal prayer be unto Him who answereth by fire! 

Finally, I hasten to say, that after all the chief cause 
of infidelity is to be found in the heart. That a single 
one of these evil agencies alluded to accomplishes its 
work is owing to the corrupt heart that, often without 



174 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

appeal, opens promptly to their approach. Infidelity 
can only originate in two sources — lack of intellec- 
tual evidence, or else lack of moral inclination. It is 
idle to contend that with the large majority of unbe- 
lievers it is want of intellectual evidence that is in the 
way. Unquestionably, want of moral inclination is the 
preponderant evil. Here is the ever present and most 
formidable source of infidelity. It withstands and 
throws off, as every honest man knows, all evidence, 
both of argument and of practical result. Men ape 
unbelievers for the most part, not on account of supe- 
rior knowledge, study, argument, and mastery of con- 
viction, but from deep controlling desire. Does a man 
deny the existence of a God ? It is because the evil 
nature in him has uttered protest. He does not want 
God to be. Lord Bacon says : " None deny there is 
a God, but those for whom it maketh that there were 
no God." Does a man deny the Scriptures and scorn 
Christ and His Cross ? Is it because wisdom has con- 
centrated in him ; because the light of the universe 
flashes from his soul, or because by overwhelming tes- 
timony he is able to overthrow the most vigorous 
thinking and the most enlightened and holiest experi- 
ence of the ages ? The pretense is absurd. An evil 
heart of unbelief, along with the god of this world, hath 
blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the 
light of the glorious Gospel of Christ , who is the image 
of God, should shine unto them. The evil heart wants 
no moral restraint. The thought of God and holiness, 
though both the expression of eternal beauty and joy, 



SOME CAUSES OF INFIDELITY. 1 75 

are uncongenial. The Apostle includes the entire 
dread calamity in a sentence when he says — The carnal 
mind is enmity against God, for it is not subject to the 
law of God y neither indeed can be. 

It is just as much the disposition of the unrenewed 
nature to oppose the truth, as it is the delight of the 
renewed man to trust in and illustrate it. While the 
heart is wrong, the enemy has the man. Out of the 
heart are the issues of life, and out of it are the issues 
of death also. Until God gains admission to the heart, 
faith is not possible. Hence the first aim of the Gos- 
pel is to break through the hard fast gates of the heart. 
When men's hearts are overborne, melted into peni- 
tence, kindled into trust, and renewed by the Holy 
Ghost, when their deep desires go out to God, when 
their supreme affections embrace the holy and the 
spiritual, then every enlightened man knows that they 
are not degraded, not fallen into ignorance, not less 
trustworthy and useful and happy than they were be- 
fore, but exalted in all ; and then infidelity, with all its 
ignorance, unfairness, unreasonableness and license, is 
gone. When God has the heart, evil is expelled, the 
very body becomes the temple of the Holy Ghost. 
The regeneration of the heart is the restoration of or- 
der. If any man be in Christ he is a new creature — 
a new creation — God's own workmanship. Infidelity 
is not only the perversion of truth, it is also the per- 
version of the moral nature. It is rebellion in the 
soul against God's perfections and government. Man's 
heart was made to be the shrine of Christian faith, 



I76 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

love and holiness. The inclusive cause of all unbelief 
is the unrenewed heart. The surest and most suc- 
cessful method of overthrowing the monster is earnest 
faithful preaching and praying for the heart's regene- 
ration. Who wins a human heart to the Lord Jesus 
Christ, deals a fatal blow upon the citadel of unbelief, 
and best shows that it is a house built upon sand. 

Merciful God ! help us ; reveal the Gospel to us, 
and thy purpose in it; give us mastery over the hearts 
of men, and deliver their souls into our hands as cap- 
tains of Thine host! 



CHAPTER VIII. 

SOME WEAKNESSES OF INFIDELITY. 

THERE are two indisputable facts, in the constant 
illustration of which Christianitv has accumulated 
strength from the beginning. They are adequate evi- 
dence and excellence of character. In both of these- 
the Gospel faith stands preeminent, which is to say- 
that it rests upon truth, and is buttressed about by - 
every imperishable virtue. In its own perfections andl 
results we have the undoubted assurance of its final, 
triumph. 

It is one of the wonders of the Divine administration,: 
that along with the passing ages, and the ever-chang- 
ing methods of infidel attack, adequate evidence has . 
always been produced, exposing the shallowness of 
the enemies' assault and presenting in brighter light 
the truthfulness of the Christian system. We cannot 
but think he is controlled by prejudice, rather than, 
familiar with manifest facts, who will venture to deny 
that Christianity is sustained in the claims it makes by • 
an amount of evidence which cannot be equaled by • 
any system of human philosophy, or any man-devised ! 
religion. It stands without an equal or a rival in the 
amount and character of testimony which declares it 
to be from God and for man. Its doctrines and facts 
s* (177) 



I78 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

blend strangely and convincingly with nature and 
history. The very order and progress of the world 
put upon it the seal of truth, and render the severest 
assaults of men unsuccessful. Even the skeptical 
Renan, referring to this harmony of dogma and fact 
with nature and historic events, was compelled to 
say — " The striking accord between the text and the 
places, the marvellous harmony of the Bible ideas with 
the country which serves them for a frame, was to me 
like a revelation." 

I cannot go into details, but I make bold to say that 
no candid man can charge Christianity with weakness 
because of lack of unanswerable evidence to sustain its 
claims. The evidence is abundant and reliable, and 
upon any material social or intellectual question, the 
one-half of it would be ample to convince any reason- 
able and fair-minded man. The difficulty with unbe- 
lieving men is not want of sufficient evidence, but a 
controlling hostility to Christianity which forbids any 
sincere examination and test of the evidence at hand. 
In any event it remains true that after centuries of 
varied and violent assault, Christianity is still here, the 
greatest fact in history, and the best force in civiliza- 
tion ; which is to say, that the evidence and character 
by which its claims are sustained are very far from 
visionary, presumptuous, or false. So, too, its excel- 
lent character girds it with a mastery against which 
neither the most subtle and formidable attacks of men 
nor the gates of hell shall ever prevail. 

Holiness is imperishable, and it is the mission of 



SOME WEAKNESSES OF INFIDELITY. 1 79 

Christianity to promote this in the hearts and lives of 
men. This is the advantage and strength of Christian- 
ity, its ever-present and unanswerable commendation. 
Master this ! As well attempt to discrown God Him- 
self. Christianity is not only the promoter, but the 
source of every excellence. It is God's own image, 
God's own perfections and purpose, God's own life in 
the world. What it is, and what it has wrought, 
furnish it a perpetual and an invulnerable ground of 
defence, and give emphasis to its own frank warning 
to its foes — Refrain from these men, and let them alone ; 
for if this counsel or this work be of men, it will come 
to nought, but if it be of God, ye cannot overthrow it ; 
lest haply ye be found even to fight against God. 

Now it is just in these two particulars of adequate 
evidence and correctness of character that infidelity is 
wanting and constantly reveals its weakness. If infi- 
delity would supplant Christianity, if it would appeal 
to human reason and intelligence, certainly it must 
furnish adequate testimony in its own behalf; and if 
it would challenge the respect of respectable men, it 
must produce a character that merits esteem. This 
character must not grow out of the pervasive influence 
of some other opposing system, but it must be the 
legitimate fruit of its own principles. In short, infidel- 
ity must forever remain weak unless it can show that 
it has truth for a basis, and that it can elevate and en- 
noble men in every way. That its own character and 
results entirely fail to sustain these conditions, is one 
of the plainest and most significant facts of history. 



1 80 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

In proof, we affirm that the weakness of infidelity 
appears in the fallacy of argument and incorrectness of 
statement by which, in all time, it has sought to de- 
fend and commend itself. It never makes its claim on 
its own merits, and is as unwilling to judge Christianity 
by the same truthful standard. Unmindful of its spirit 
and purpose, it seeks every opportunity to judge and 
condemn it according to evils done in its name, by evil 
minded or mistaken men. Hence a large stock in trade 
with the infidel is made up of those cruelties and wrongs 
which have resulted from the corruption and perver- 
sion of Christianity, but which have no more to do 
with its spirit, principles and aim than dishonesty and 
theft have to do with the correct principles of business. 
In the words of the writer elsewhere : "A diamond is 
none the less beautiful and valuable because it flashes 
on the finger of an assassin or libertine. Bad men, 
mistaken, prejudiced men, have and still sometimes 
hold up the broad, bright shield of the Christian faith 
before them, while they pervert its truth, violate its 
spirit, and buffet His cheek whose dying compassion 
for His enemies mingled with and transfigured His 
bitterest agony into a prayer of mercy. From the 
great globe-heart of Christianity not a single wrong 
that has ever been perpetrated in its name gets any- 
thing but rebuke. It is unfair to take any unsightly 
caricature, the product of man's imperfect and totter- 
ing character, as any test of the original." There is 
no disposition, no need, to conceal ; on the other hand, 
we are frank to admit that " the cruelties, lusts, and 



SOME WEAKNESSES OF INFIDELITY. l8l 

ambitions of those who have stood as princes in the so- 
ciety called by its name — the treacheries, conflagrations, 
wholesale murders, accomplished by those who have 
borne with crimsoned hands its consecrated banners — 
these are, assuredly, frightful to contemplate." But it 
is the falsification of truth outdone to make Christianity 
responsible for such inhuman atrocities. They are not 
the result of Christianity any more than license is the 
fruit of liberty, or lust the expression of love. 

Still, infidelity affecting great horror over these 
monster evils, kindred to more for which it is respon- 
sible and to which it is willingly blind, persists in pro- 
claiming them as the legitimate fruit of Christianity. 
Now the fact is, these very evils have originated in 
superstition, hypocrisy, bigotry, ignorance and unbe- 
lief, so that by every mark of fair test they are the 
product of some form of infidelity, and have not the 
slightest relationship to Christianity. It is only when 
men have other interests than truth to serve that they 
are unwilling to distinguish the heavenly from the 
earthly, the religion of Christ from the ignorance, pre- 
tense, and unbelief of men. Is our form of govern- 
ment to be held responsible for the corruptions that 
have often disgraced it? Is our civilization to be de- 
nounced because men kill and steal and imbrute them- 
selves ? Why should Christianity be held responsible 
for crimes against which its law thunders, its whole 
spirit and purpose protest, and every gate of its holy 
kingdom is fast closed? Only an unfair, weak adver- 
sary will take such blushless advantage. The assault 



I 82 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

is not the testimony of truth, it is a confession of 
weakness ; it is the pretext of infidelity, and not the 
extremity of Christianity. 

Equally pitiable does this weakness appear in the 
manner in which infidelity perverts and misstates the 
truths of Christianity. It is an old habit, invented in 
the garden when sin blushed its innocence, and not 
without effect where ignorance, hatred of God and 
truth, and love of self and sin dominate. In the nature 
of the case infidelity hates truth; it has no faculty for 
the use of so clean and strong a weapon, and it must 
get rid of it if possible, if not by fair, then by unfair 
means. I take three examples, far apart, unequal in 
intellect but kindred in spirit and aim, as representa- 
tives, and as furnishing proof to the charge made. It 
was the confession of Hume that he never read the 
Bible with attention. How then, could he deal fairly 
with it in denying its truth ? Beginning with such a 
bias, animated with such a spirit, may we accept his 
testimony with intelligent confidence ? May we count 
on fair, impartial statement in such a case? Is there a 
court in the land that has high regard for justice, that 
would accept the testimony or verdict of such a man ? 
How can he decide finally for us in matters of ever- 
vital and eternal interest? Among English skeptics, 
he was undoubtedly the ablest in his time. He was 
not an atheist, and all the more on this account is his 
testimony against miracles open to the charge of 
weakness, for to admit that God is, and then deny the 
possibility of miracles is absurd. There is a sad tone 



SOME WEAKNESSES OF INFIDELITY. 1 83 

in his own confession made after the death of his 
mother, and in reply to a charge that he had broken 
with all Christian hope, which is significant, and shows 
that while one of the great thinkers of his day, he was 
wholly incompetent to give just judgment upon spir- 
itual fact and truth. Note his words — " Though I 
throw out my speculations to entertain the learned 
and metaphysical world, yet in other things I do not 
think so differently from the rest of the world as you 
imagine." Here is a confession of pride of intellect: 
he would assail the Gospel miracles " to entertain the 
learned and metaphysical world," his shrine of devo- 
tion was his own philosophical scheme. Can the tes- 
timony of such a misguided soul against Christian 
truth be fair or true? Impossible! 

Later came Voltaire, a man of gifts, but full of hos- 
tility and misstatement in his assault against Christi- 
tianity. One or two examples will suffice. He says — 
" It is a truth that none of the first fathers of the 
church, to Irenaeus inclusive, cites a single passage 
of the four Gospels which we know." The citations 
of Irenaeus might here be given; let it suffice to say, 
that his references are universally acknowledged ; and 
he it is who has taken care to furnish reasons (fanciful 
enough) why there could only be four Gospels. In 
another place he says that "Jesus could neither read 
nor write." His familiarity with the Old Testament 
might be sufficient answer to this charge, but to it we 
add the stronger testimony of the Scriptures. — And 
He came to Nazareth; and y as His custom was, He 



184 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

went into the synagogue on the Sabbath, and stood up 
for to read, * * * And when He had opened the 
book, He found the place where it was written, The 
spirit of the Lord is upon me, etc. * * * And He 
closed the book, and He gave it again to the minister, 
and sat down. — Luke iv. 17-20. Jesus stooped down 
and with His finger wrote on the ground. * * 
And again He stooped down and wrote on the ground. 
— John viii. 6-8. In one of his works he puts Peter 
in self-defence before Paul against the charge of eat- 
ing with the Gentiles, and produces " Peter's vision of 
the sheet as part of his defence then and there, in 
Antioch, whereas it had been adduced long before, 
and to a different audience, in Jerusalem." Again he 
censures Paul for circumcising Timothy, after the fol- 
lowing had been written to the Galatians. — If ye be 
circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing. The un- 
truth of this statement is most palpable, for Tim- 
othy was circumcised some time before a line of 
this Epistle was written. Surely you will not chide 
me for agreeing with another, when he says — " Who- 
ever will follow Voltaire in matters of Scripture fact, 
and correct him, has work on hand." 

Passing by others to whom the same test can be 
applied with damage to the cause of infidelity, we come 
down to our modern apostle of unbelief, whose blas- 
phemous assault upon Christianity, if not more worthy 
of respect than that of those we have noticed, has cer- 
tainly yielded him a larger pecuniary profit. 

A brief notice of two lectures will give us the moral 



SOME WEAKNESSES OF INFIDELITY. 1 85 

measure of all. The title of the first is : " What must 
I do to be saved ?-" I shudder at the thought of a 
rational, responsible man rising before an audience of 
sinful beings hastening to the judgment of Almighty 
God, to mock over such a question. But such is the 
brazen effrontery and the manifest weakness of infidel- 
ity. In. that lecture the author says: "We have a 
Christian system, and that system is founded on what 
they are pleased to call the New Testament. Who 
wrote the New Testament? I don't know. Who 
does know? Nobody." There is just one frank and 
truthful statement in this assertion, and that is the con- 
fession of the lecturer's ignorance. The New Testa- 
ment was not written in the dark, and thrust secretly 
upon the world. It challenges the severest criticism; 
it has been tried as by fire, and infidelity to-day is 
feeble before its historic testimony. Whom are we to 
believe ? This man who begins by heartily hating the 
Bible, with a prodigious capacity for ridicule, and who 
certainly will not venture to make any claim to schol- 
arly attainment ; or are we to believe the ablest 
scholars in the land, whose characters are above re- 
proach, and whose lives are a benediction to the race ? 
I venture to say that more time, more impartial, tho- 
rough-going, honest work, more sincere desire to as- 
ascertain only the truth, has been given by many a 
single one of these able and godly men to the investi- 
gation of the historic claims of the Holy Scriptures, 
than has been accorded to the same work by all the 
infidels of a century. The author of " What must I 



1 86 ' VITAL QUESTIONS. 

do to be saved ?" says he does not know who wrote 
the New Testament. Certainly not — and he is just as 
poorly qualified to pass honest judgment on its author- 
ship as any other man of equal ignorance. In another 
place he says there is not a word about believing any- 
thing in the Gospel according to Matthew. Either his 
conception of faith is new and narrow, or else he is 
pitiably ignorant of the contents of the Gospel of 
which he speaks. I submit the testimony of our Lord. 
— When Jesus heard it he marvelled, and said to them 
that followed, Verily I say unto you, I have not found so 
great faith — no, not in Israel. — Matt. viii. 10. Daughter, 
be of good comfort, thy faith hath made thee whole. Be- 
lieve ye that I am able to do this ? They said unto Him, 
Yea, Lord. Then touched He their eyes saying, Accord- 
ing to your faith be it unto you. — Matt. ix. 22, 28, 29. 
Whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe 
in me, it were better for him that a 7nillstone were hanged 
about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth 
of the sea. — Matt, xviii. 6. All things whatsoever ye 
shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive. — Matt 
xxi. 22. I submit, is there nothing about believing 
anything in the Gospel of Matthew? Rather is not 
this Gospel permeated from first to last with the great 
thought of belief? From beginning to end, this lec- 
ture abounds with such misrepresentation. The whole 
web is woven of rotten thread. The music of the piece 
is a jargon of discord. The argument is manufactured 
to fit the case, and not to determine and enforce the 
truth. 



SOME WEAKNESSES OF INFIDELITY. 1 8/ 

Take another lecture. Its presumptuous title is 
V The Mistakes of Moses." In his swaggering man- 
ner the author says — " The gentleman who wrote it 
(Genesis) begins by telling us that God made it (this 
world) out of nothing." The statement is as false as 
it is disrespectful; Moses said — In the beginning God 
created the heavens a?id the earth. The heavens and 
the earth were not evolved, they came not by chance, 
but " in the beginning," when that was it is not stated, 
only that "in the beginning God created" them. This 
is the simple, grand and truthful statement. Again — 
" You recollect that the gods came down and made 
love to the daughters of men, etc." The manly, truth- 
ful man recollects no such thing. Moses has spoken 
no such word. This is another mistake of the author 
of the " Mistakes of Moses." "They built a tower to 
reach the heavens and climb into the abodes of the 
gods." The tower of Babel, to which reference is 
made, was built for a very different purpose. In 
speaking of the vegetation of the third day, he says — 
" Not a blade of grass had ever been touched by a 
single gleam of light." How does that accord with 
the narrative which he presumes to criticise? And 
God said: Let there be light, and there was light. 
And the evening and the morning were the first day. — 
Gen. i. 3, 5. His coarse witticisms and statements 
concerning the flood are equally false; we turn away 
from them with more of pity than of censure for a man 
who could so degrade his gifts, by stooping to defend 
his bad cause by such blushless misrepresentation and 



1 88 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

studied deception. Of these purposely misleading and 
untruthful assertions, an entire volume could easily be 
compiled — and what a monument of shame it would be ; 
by its very boldness confirming, not the cause of infi- 
delity, but the truth of Christianity, and especially 
that truth which reveals the blindness of unbelief and 
the corresponding enmity of the natural heart toward 
God and His Word. 

To the sincere and truthful antagonist we are bound 
to show respect; but when men pervert and falsify to 
gain their end, the best elements of manhood revolt 
from their course, and the weakness of their cause is 
manifest in the untruthfulness of their method. 

The weakness of infidelity is set forth again in its 
lack of those elements which are essential to a noble 
character and a correct manhood. It cannot be with- 
out reason that infidelity is at once suggestive and 
promotive of immorality. Tested by its own fruit in 
the world, the testimony of both history and experience 
is against it. Would it not be bold, indeed, for any 
man to affirm that unbelief of God and of the Christian 
Scriptures is productive of moral order, of true benev- 
olence, of justice, of obedience to proper law, of all 
virtue, and of reverence, that amethyst of worthy char- 
acter? Is it a fact that infidelity furnishes the soil for 
the growth and cultivation of these ? Presumptuous 
and blasphemous as it sometimes is, I have not heard 
it claimed that these great essentials of character, of 
government, of civilization, are to be found in it. Infi- 
dels are singularly silent on their system as a source 



SOME WEAKNESSES OF INFIDELITY. 1 89 

of and stimulus to the great cardinal virtues. Such a 
claim would be an insult to the intelligence, and a 
slander upon the uprightness of mankind. All infidels 
are not immoral; some of them are respectful and 
worthy of social esteem ; the refinements of home, and 
the touch of those here and there who would surrender 
life itself rather than renounce their Christian faith, have 
put a becoming restraint upon them. The point is, 
that mere morality is no bar to infidelity, neither is the 
want of it any hindrance. A man may be as selfish as 
Voltaire, as debauched as Paine, without interfering in 
the least with unbelief, except to magnify its mastery. 
Think of that, young man, before you embrace it. 
You cannot dispense with character and hope to suc- 
ceed. The last thing infidelity thinks of accomplish- 
ing is the improvement of the moral character of its 
victim. Here at least it is consistent. To enforce 
and develop the principles of morality is not its mis- 
sion; it comes to waste these, and in this it suc- 
ceeds. Suppose a young man, or any man, resolves 
to adopt it, in what will the first payment for his ven- 
ture consist ? Character, undoubtedly. No man can, 
no man ever did, become an unbeliever without a per- 
ceptible loss forthwith in morals, in happiness, in stand- 
ing, and all permanent hopefulness, both for this world 
and the world to come. This fact is true whether ap- 
plied to individuals or to communities. There is not 
a flood-gate of evil which infidelity does not fling open, 
and through them the large majority of unbelievers 
rush headlong. Unbelief, rank and avowed, and im- 



I9O VITAL QUESTIONS. 

morality, are akin and inseparable. They have always 
united in the basest of conquests. Is it not true that 
the religion of the Bible is most acceptable where men 
are most disposed to the maintenance and practice of 
order and right ? Is it not equally true that infidel- 
ity leaps highest in its hate of everything pure and 
good, is least blushed in its assault on God and truth, 
gains the most adherents, and gains them quickest, 
where moral restraint is thrown off, and all proper law 
is defied? Listen to the profane revolt of this class 
as it thunders down the ages in revolution, ruin and 
irreverent acclaim. 

The voices of such men as Voltaire, Stirner, Paine, 
La Mettrie, and of the like company, are easily de- 
tected in the wild shout of the ribald crowd, that 
pointed the finger of scorn at the holy Son of God and 
said, " Away with Him! Away with Him!" What 
wonder that to such " virtue and vice were empty 
words," and base indulgence " the chief care of a rea- 
sonable man." After that it was easy to fling every 
rein loose on the hot, hard neck of passion. Do 
you say that these are extreme cases? True, but 
they are all the fairer test for that, for they furnish the 
legitimate and fullest development of infidelity, and 
show most conclusively that there is nothing in the 
system to prevent such baseness of character, but 
everything to produce it. What does it mean, I ask 
in all sincerity, that atheism and infidelity in all the 
ages have gathered to themselves the refuse of society, 
the lawless and dangerous classes ? Is it not because 



SOME WEAKNESSES OF INFIDELITY. I9I 

there is something in it that responds to the corrupt 
and unrestrained nature of its unfortunate subjects? 
There is a strange affinity between them which brings 
them into fellowship. Wheresover the carcass is, there 
will the eagles be gathered together. 

Why is it that in proportion as men surrender to 
every unholy license, they abandon all thought of 
God, can buffet the cheek of Christ in scorn, and brave 
eternity with stolid indifference? Is there no argu- 
ment in this? More than once unbelieving men have 
been startled at the results of their principles, and have 
been led to soften or extenuate their views. In Hume 
there is undoubted " evidence of reaction and recoil 
from the gloom of doubt, which no one has more 
eloquently expressed." Voltaire and his companions 
were shocked at the atrocities of the Revolution, but 
in this they only had the legitimate fruit of the tree 
they had themselves planted, and the tree must be 
judged by its fruit. There was nothing then, and 
there is nothing now, in infidelity, to prevent these 
dreadful results. 

The elements of which infidelity is composed are 
all destructive, they are essentially immoral; in history 
and experience, though they have had long trial, they 
are without any commendable testimony, and he that 
is deceived thereby is not wise. I .know with what 
confidence the unbelief of our time shouts the watch- 
word of the " Revolution," and demands for what it is 
pleased to style "a priest-ridden race" — "Liberty, 
Equality, and Fraternity!' With God dethroned in 



192 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

the heart and life of a great nation, with His will and 
law trodden under unhallowed feet, the world shivers 
to-day as it reads the awful wrongs that were wrought 
under the shrill cry of these perverted words. With 
the same system dominant, how may we look for a 
different result now? The liberty of skepticism is the 
violation of all restraint, the triumph of every indul- 
gence, and this is the equality of basest injustice, the 
overthrow of the rights of one to secure the selfishly 
conceived rights of another, and this is the fraternity 
of hell. 

I know nothing in which the baseness of the char- 
acter of avowed infidelity appears more distinctly than 
in its pretentious plea for liberty. As the writer has 
elsewhere said — "The highest liberty is the liberty of 
right, the liberty of order without constraint, the exer- 
cise of every noble faculty in its proper sphere. It is 
the liberty of the stars, that never rush into mutiny 
against their king; the liberty of the birds, that sing 
and trust Him who feedeth them; the liberty of angels, 
whose largest freedom is submission to the sovereign 
will. * * * * Wherever wrong and error domi- 
nate, there we may look for the galling yoke and 
the tyrant's sceptre; but that we shall find noblest, 
truest liberty, wherever truth guides and the Spirit of 
the Lord is, is as certain as that we shall see the flush 
of dawn by looking toward the east in the morning." 
Of all tyrannies that ever fretted the soul and cursed 
the life of man, the tyranny of unbelief is the crudest 
and the worst. Before any man adopts it as a creed 



SOME WEAKNESSES OF INFIDELITY. 1 93 

to guide his life here, and to determine his destiny 
hereafter, it would only be the exercise of a proper 
respect for his manhood to subject its moral elements 
and results to careful test, and to look to the character 
of the company he is bound to keep in such a case. 
These words may fall under the eye of some young 
man about whom the destroyer has already com- 
menced to put its fatal coil. With affectionate voice 
let me sound a note of warning. In a little while it 
will be too late. I would touch your tenderest mem- 
ories, if indeed I might induce you to retrace your 
steps and flee from the deceptive and awful shadows 
that are beginning to enfold you. Your mother was 
neither deluded nor degraded when she adopted the 
Christian faith, which you perchance have abandoned. 
She showed in that choice that her mind was clearer, 
and her heart purer than your own, and you cannot 
think of her to-day, nor stand by her hallowed grave 
without a conviction, deep down in your soul, that this 
is so. Oh, what a crime, if you have put the gloomy 
shadows of skepticism between your soul and such a 
memory ! 

By what potent spell shall I call up again the image 
of your early home, and open your eyes to see in her 
face who bore you, truth, and beauty, and heaven ? I 
fain would stand and plead with you ; I would call by 
all the flood of memories over which you have swept 
the darkness, by a mother's love and prayers if she 
live, and by her grave over which the angels keep 
watch if she be dead, come back ! come back ! To 
9 



IQ4 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

this let me add the kindly and telling words of one 
from whose experience a merciful God has saved the 
writer. " To you, young men, who are beginning to 
entertain skeptical views, let me offer a word of coun- 
sel and warning. * * * I have trod the dreadful 
path from beginning to end. I know it all. It is a 
weary and dismal road, and it leads to wretchedness 
and ruin. I have had proof of its deteriorating in- 
fluence in my own experience — its tendency to utter 
debasement. I have studied both sides, and what is 
more, I have tried both ; and the result is a full assur- 
ance that infidelity is madness, and that the religion 
of Christ is the perfection of wisdom and goodness." 
— Joseph Barker. 

Candidly, whether I test unbelief on the side of evi- 
dence, of moral character, or of personal experience, I 
can find nothing in it but the constant illustration of 
pitiable weakness. 

Finally, the weakness of infidelity is apparent in its 
determination to destroy what we have, without ability 
or desire to furnish an equivalent. 

In history nothing is more manifest than that the 
mission of infidelity is destructive. It has never filled 
the sky with such a chorus as heralded the advent of 
Christ. It has ever sought to pull down the best in- 
stitutions of the nations, and to blight the fairest pros- 
pects that have lighted the path of progress. For 
government, for law and order, for culture and virtue, 
for peace and happiness, what has it done ? Where are 
its bevevolent, educational and merciful institutions? 



SOME WEAKNESSES OF INFIDELITY. I95 

In reply to such questions we hear nothing but its 
boastful shout, and the thunder of its captains as they 
make relentless war on all that is beautiful, and pure, 
and good in the world. Its avowed purpose is not to 
build up, but to pull down. It would bow to the shrine 
of self in long jubilee could it see every church, every 
Christian college, asylum, hospital and home demol- 
ished. It curses the intolerance of the Church, while 
to achieve its own base ends it offers no quarter. On 
its own merits, and as a legitimate rival, it does not 
pretend to build up its system, but it is only content to 
rear its helpless fabric on the ruins of that which has 
proven itself the world's supreme blessing. Surely 
Christianity is of some consequence in this world. 
Candidly, can any man produce a system that has 
wrought the thousandth part of the good the Christian 
system has achieved ? Admit that bad men, that mis- 
taken advocates, have often perverted it, and wrought 
even crime in its name; is it not after all the best of 
all systems for society, for homes, and for nations ? 
Has human life ever appeared to so splendid an advan- 
tage, ever achieved so nobly, ever left so inspiring 
a memory, as when inspired and moulded by it? 
Frankly, are not truly Christian men and women the 
best parents, the best citizens, the purest in example 
and influence, the most easily governed, the safest to 
follow, the freest from the revolutions and lawlessness 
of society, and the best conservers and promoters of 
all that is excellent in the community and in the na- 
tion? Are the institutions of Christianity, scattered 



I96 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

all over this broad land, its schools and colleges, its 
asylums and hospitals, contributors to the crime and 
misery of the land, or are they preventives ? Can we 
tear up these root and branch, blot out their name and 
history, and not sink the nation's best hope in the aw- 
ful catastrophe? It is just this infidelity desires and 
aims to accomplish. With malice aforethought, it has 
come to destroy — only to destroy. In its track I see 
nothing but desolation and ruin. It has no song to 
shout any noble victory for God and humanity, for in 
all its history no such triumph is recorded. 

I submit, does such a purpose indicate strength or 
weakness? Who will venture to make the exchange? 
Give up faith in God, faith in Christ, faith in the ever- 
lasting Gospel, faith in love, truth, holiness and heaven ; 
for cold, cheerless, wasteful, helpless infidelity ? All 
that is noble in me rises up to say, No ! The storms 
of life still blow; sin and suffering, sorrow and death 
are still here. Infidelity, like a roaring lion, still goes 
about seeking whom it may devour. Let us thank 
God for the one brightening beam of light on the 
cloud, for the one safe refuge from the storm in Chris- 
tianity, for an unfailing compass in the blessed Bible, 
as we make the voyage over the rough sea; for an Al- 
mighty Saviour in Jesus Christ, for an enduring, inspir- 
ing hope, blazing in the darkness, and surely lighting 
our way to the port of peace. Here is help, here is 
assurance, here is strength — the very girding of Al- 
mighty God. Infidelity may do what it can in its hate 
and weakness to pull down this fair temple, but under 



SOME WEAKNESSES OF INFIDELITY. 1 97 

its lofty dome, radiant with the love of God, and reso- 
nant with the chantings of the redeemed, I propose to 
live with martyrs and angels and apostles, the spirits 
of the just, and the excellent of the earth, and with 
Jesus, our Elder Brother, until some better shelter is 
provided for me. This is the verdict of intelligence 
and common sense, as well as the loving counsel of the 
Christian Faith. 



CHAPTER IX. 

THE POWER AND EXCELLENCE OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH 
CONTRASTED WITH THE WEAKNESS OF INFIDELITY, 

THERE is no more debating with a reasonable man 
about the existence of a mountain, when he stands 
at its base and looks up at its rocky crest. He says, 
" 1 see," and that is the end of all controversy. We 
may not always be so successful with men with respect 
to Christianity, for they are often too blind to see the 
spiritual when brought face to face with it; but the 
probability of conversion will undoubtedly be in- 
creased by a testimony that appeals to the outward 
sense as well as to the inward soul. It is a distinction 
of Christianity that it has not only always been willing 
to be judged by its own merits, but that fairly so tried 
it has never failed to endure the test. Manifestly it is 
but just that infidelity be required to submit to the 
same standard of judgment. If it cannot stand upon 
its own merits, its effort to sustain and commend itself 
by the denial and perversion of the facts and doctrines 
of Christianity, will never furnish it with a reasonable 
appeal, nor any hope of universal and permanent con- 
quest. It is not without significance that infidelity is 
not partial to this form of test. It thunders its tirade 
of denial upon Christianity as if it were a dangerous 
enemy in our midst, without a single excellence in its 

(198) 



EXCELLENCE OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. 1 99 

favor. It is a trick of infidelity to evade the test of 
merit. It begins by assuming — never proving, but 
assuming — that Christianity is thoroughly bad, and so 
forestalls the possibility of any virtue. 

Mr. Newman, in his " Phases of Faith," in which he 
labors to get rid of an historical Christ and makes 
bold to insinuate that our Lord was far from perfect, 
and that His character as described by the evangelists 
is largely imaginary, maintains, certainly to the dis- 
credit of his intelligence and of his manhood that, "if 
he is asked to specify the faults of that matchless 
chararter, he is not bound to do so." Is that not 
a weak begging of the question ? If he is not bound 
to specify these faults, on what moral ground can 
he sustain so unmanly a suspicion? Does not his 
very attitude render respectful confidence in his state- 
ment impossible? He is ready to deny that Christ 
was a perfect being, but is unwilling to furnish the 
proof. The denial is convenient; the barest attempt 
at its confirmation would be damaging. In other 
words, along with the free-thinking class in general, 
he is unwilling to accord to Christianity the advantage 
of its own merits, nor will he allow infidelity to be 
subjected to the same reasonable and ample test. No 
matter, sensible and fair-minded men will have it so. 
The better judgment of the race will resist any effort 
to over-ride and master it by a spirit and method so 
palpably unjust and degrading. Here is the supreme 
advantage of the Bible religion. Every excellence, 
every principle, every condition, every noble result of 



200 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

Christianity, is a path leading to its temple gate ; and 
we hail a method so fair and unanswerable, by which 
the learned and unlearned alike may come to the 
threshold and behold with their own eyes the splendid 
fabric of our holy faith, and hear with their ears the 
message of life and the music of hope that come from 
within. 

There are two ways of ascertaining a knowledge ot 
the Christian faith. One is through the written Reve- 
lation, another by its manifest results in the world, and 
still another by personal experience. The two first 
are included in the last one, but the last is not 
always included with either of the former. We ap- 
proach unbelieving men, especially those who have 
avowed infidelity, at disadvantage with any of these ; 
for in the true sense they can only be spiritually dis- 
cerned, and the unbelieving heart is not only wanting 
in but strangely hostile to the spiritual faculty. Still 
it is possible for any one in our time to read the letter 
of the Word, and to examine and judge of its historical 
testimony, so ample and reliable ; and who may not 
note the visible results of Christianity manifest on 
every hand, and made distinct to the dullest by the 
unmistakable coronation they receive in contrast with 
the results of infidelity ? Infidelity is not disposed to 
recognize the testimony of experience, though the fact, 
admitted elsewhere, is not less real and convincing in 
Christianity. It is rooted in this case in commend- 
able character, and this involves again the question of 
merit, and unbelief for its own sake is bound to avoid 



EXCELLENCE OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. 201 

this test. Of this experience the unbeliever knows 
nothing, and he presumptuously concludes that what 
he does not know cannot be taken as evidence in the 
case. Could unreasonable self-conceit ask more than 
this? Christianity is not simply a thing of outward 
results ; it is more than a system of doctrine ; it is in 
addition an inward life, of which the human soul can 
be as conscious and as assured as of any physical fact. 
It aims at the enlightenment and regeneration of man's 
moral being, not only as a redemption from sin, but as 
a means of highest knowledge. It is indeed one of 
its virtues that it furnishes the human heart an endow- 
ment by which it may look upon God and comprehend 
His will. If any man will do his will he shall know 
of the doctrine, whether it be of God. — John vii. 17. 
To the reality and value of this method every believer 
on earth is a witness. Men try infidelity, and ascer- 
tain what it can do for them ; they apply to it this 
strictly scientific test, and by the knowledge thus 
gained an unanswerable conviction is begotten against 
it, in all frank and anxious minds. Every saved soul 
to a greater or less extent can certify to the efficacy of 
this test. If infidelity refuses the application of such 
a test, it only shows its weakness, and that its claims 
are not entitled to the respect of enlightened and right 
minded men. No man, we maintain, can claim to be 
sincere in his unbelief who is unwilling to accord to 
Christianity such a trial as will conform to its spirit 
and purpose ; and so surely can it only be fairly and 
thoroughly known by experience, that all protest 
9* 



202 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

against it must be regarded, not as the result of knowl- 
edge, but of the want of it. Is it the sincere and long- 
ing wish of your heart, O man, to know and possess 
the truth ? Humbly come to its source, and try it as 
it merits and as it directs, or else for the sake of your 
intellect, your manhood, and all that commands self- 
respect about you, cease to reject and contend against 
that which God has given, at infinite cost of love, for 
your rescue in grace, and for your absolute perfection 
in glory. taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed 
is the man that trustcth in Him. — Ps. xxxiv. 8. 

It is easy to walk into a grocery store, and without 
having tested any, pronounce the merchant's entire 
stock worthless and unworthy the patronage of the 
community. But would such a flippant verdict be 
truthful? Would it be manly or respectful? Yet, 
just in this manner do the mass of unbelievers, many 
of whom lay claim to intelligence and regard for 
truth, dispose of Christianity. Tis not a question 
with them whether it is true or untrue, good or bad ; 
it is in their way, and somehow it must be disposed of, 
so that the storm may thunder on unresisted in their 
track of ruin. They instinctively shrink from testing 
it on its own merits, thereby showing that it is not 
adverse knowledge concerning it that excites their 
prejudice against it, but an inborn hatred that with 
the passing years has grown to such mastery as to 
pervert and blind every moral and intellectual faculty, 
until all desire for and all power to* apprehend spiritual 
truth are gone. Infidelity destroys at once the facul- 



EXCELLENCE OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. 203 

ties by which its own weakness and the power and 
blessedness of Christianity are to be discovered. 

If infidelity could produce a vast amount of external 
proof in its own favor, that would not be sufficient to 
establish it. We should still demand to know of what 
spirit it is. It might put on a fair show outside and 
be wholly unworthy at heart; indeed, it has not failed 
sometimes to practice this means of deception ; but the 
question of merit with all systems that challenge the 
respect and faith of men, goes deeper; we must know 
the fountain whence the stream flows. Christianity 
does not depend upon external evidence alone. It 
is its excellence that there is a beautiful unity between 
its doctrines, spirit and life. The fruit is good be- 
cause the tree is good. It throws open its vast king- 
dom and bids us explore the treasures within, and 
it is only content when we touch its heart, and 
never promises to become the life of the soul unless 
its spirit is imbibed. The spirit of Christianity is a 
superlative excellence; no such crystal stream ripples 
away from the surging, corrupt fountain of infidelity. 
When this spirit is fairly imbibed, permeating the 
whole character and life, it becomes an argument of 
granite, against which the assaults of infidelity are as 
feeble as the stroke of an infant's hand would be to 
shatter the mountain crags. It is a gratifying and 
significant fact that in all ages hundreds and thousands 
who have not felt themselves competent to wrestle 
with critical investigation, have illustrated to the 
admiration of men and angels the power and ex- 



204 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

cellence of Christian faith, and have shown time 
and again, under circumstances the most trying, that 
they were not deceived, and that they were sus- 
tained by a power and presence in them, but not of 
them. The taunting questions and unfair arguments 
of foes make no impression upon them. In times of 
faint-heartedness and wavering they stand immovable, 
ever abounding in the work of the Lord. They need 
no buttressing on this side or that from public opinion. 
God is the strength of their hearts and their portion 
forever, and none are so content and so invincible as 
they. Their learning, their skill in worldly matters, 
their familiarity with the great and wealthy, may be 
very limited ; but we defy all the infidels in the world to 
prove that in character, and life, in Christian faith and 
hope, they are not excellent — a preserving salt in the 
communities in which they live, and with brows uplifted 
toward the heavens, the sons and daughters of the 
Lord God Almighty. Happy the homes in which 
they dwell, and blessed would this worried world be 
if every life-path resounded with the tramp of this 
regenerated company. Oh, supreme and excellent 
faith, by which humanity is so ennobled, life is so 
transfigured into beauty and power, God is so honored, 
and a lost world is so lifted toward the radiant and 
singing heavens ! 

So far the view has been general. Let us look at 
the subject briefly in detail. 

First. The excellence and power of the Christian 
faith appear in the elements of which it is composed: 



EXCELLENCE OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. 205 

I only detain to speak of some of the moral attri- 
butes of the Bible religion, which are peculiar to it, 
and exclusively of supernatural origin. They are not 
only distinctive of Christianity, but they distinguish it 
in such a way and under such circumstances as to 
leave it without any parallel. 

Perhaps I can name no better summary of the con- 
tents of Christianity than that given by Paul in these 
words — T lie fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long 
suffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temper- 
ance. — Gal. v. 22, 23. These are more than natural 
qualities, they are fruits of the Spirit, graces peculiar 
to the spiritual kingdom of God, and in this exalted 
sense they only manifest themselves in those who come 
to know God by faith in Jesus Christ. Each of these, 
as a gem displays its beauty in the light it throws off, 
reflects the image of God, and makes man such a reve- 
lation of His character and purpose, as is furnished by 
no other material object in the universe. Take the 
first — Love. How comprehensive, how all-inclusive, 
how beautiful is love ! Christianity originated, was 
cradled and consummated, as God's marvellous inter- 
position in our behalf in love. The essence of Chris- 
tianity is love, its law is love, its crown and glory 
is love — In this was manifest the love of God toward 
ms, because that God sent His only begotten Son into 
the world, that we might live through Him. Herein 
is love, not that we loved God, but He loved us, ana 
sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. — i John 
iv. 9, 10. The cause and the method of this expres- 



206 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

sion of love baffle us. We cannot comprehend it, but 
we know a new life and a new joy come to those 
who believe it. At least, Divine love is clearly mani- 
fest, and along with much else intended for our good, 
we cannot detain until the mystery is solved. Mys- 
tery surrounds us as the air; the mountains and the 
seas wear its close woven-robe, the stars shine from 
behind its veil, the throbbing heart and the un- 
seen pulsing soul are engirded with its mystic clasp. 
God moving in providence, flashing His will in the 
lightning, or uttering His voice in the storm, is hidden 
behind its shadow. Jesus, the child ; Jesus, prostrate 
in the garden, and sweating, as it were, drops of blood ; 
Jesus, the victim of the Cross, dying for a fallen world 
— what a mystery! The Holy Spirit, quickening, re- 
generating and building up manhood until it reflects 
the image of the Incarnate Lord — who can master 
this? Over all this mystery Christianity swings a 
lamp with brightness above the light of the sun, and 
where the darkness is deepest we read God is love. 
Blessed be God, all that baffles us is the mystery of 
love. No man can see and appreciate this princely 
perfection unless he has attained to faith, unless this 
very love is shed abroad in his heart by the Holy 
Ghost. But it is Christianity that makes the discov- 
ery to man that love is the supreme and inclusive 
perfection of God, and that it is his chief purpose to 
manifest it. 

Whatever else the atonement means, we are sure 
that it means all in this — God commendeth His love 



EXCELLENCE OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. 207 

toward us y in that while we ivere yet sinners, Christ died 
for us. — Rom. v. 8. I might easily make ample de- 
fence for Christianity on this single perfection, for 
surely infidelity at its best can produce nothing to 
match it. Did not our Lord include all He came to 
procure and offer to us in these sublime words? — 
Tlwu shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and 
with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the 
first and great commandment. And the second is like 
unto it. Thoit shalt love thy neiglibor as tliyself. — Matt, 
xxii. 37-39. To this nothing is in the way save sin 
and unbelief, and for the overthrow of these nothing is 
adequate but the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. 
Who accepts Him begins to love; and to love as God 
loves, and what God loves, is to be right. In Chris- 
tianity God is all in all, and God is love. Tis all in- 
cluded in the lines of the following hymn, which I trust 
my reader may be able to repeat both as his personal 
testimony and prayer : 

" O Love, who formedst me to wear 
The image of Thy Godhead here; 
Who soughtest me with tender care 

Thro' all my wanderings wild and drear. 
O Love, I give myself to Thee, 
Thine ever, only Thine to be. 

" O Love, who ere life's earliest dawn 
On me Thy choice hast gently laid ; 
O Love, who here as man wast born, 
And wholly like to us wast made ; 
O Love, I give myself to Thee, 
Thine ever, only Thine to be. 



208 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

" O Love, who once in time wast slain, 

Pierced through and through with bitter woe ; 
O Love, who wrestling thus did gain, 
That we eternal joy might know ; 
O Love, I give myself to Thee, 
Thine ever, only Thine to be. 

Love includes all, and where the soul sees it in God 
out of its own conscious possession of it, what so cer- 
tain to follow as Joy ? 

It has been said and with a boasting air by unbe- 
lievers that Christianity is gloomy, the doctrine of de- 
pravity horrid, and the atonement cruel. Is it true ? 
When its Founder came to this world, it was indeed 
with an environment of poverty and discomfort, but 
withal he was announced with a song, and the choris- 
ters were angels. 

Pure joy is a high faculty, and the want of it always 
indicates some defect, disorder or embarrassment. 
Human nature in innocence was never unhappy, and 
now the joy that kindles at the thought of God and 
holiness is a certain illustration of man at his best. 
When the spirit of God renews the soul, and man is 
lifted into sympathy with the Holy One, his heart is 
sure to sing, and nature herself takes on the emerald 
glory of transfiguration. Such a man inherits the 
earth : 

" He looks abroad into the varied field 
Of nature, and though poor, perhaps, compared 
With those whose mansions glitter in his sight, 
Calls the delightful scenery all his own. 
His are the mountains, and the valleys his, 



EXCELLENCE OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. 20g 

And the resplendent rivers his to enjoy 
With a propriety that none can feel, 
But who, with filial confidence inspired 
Can lift to heaven an unpresumptuous eye 
And smiling say — My Father made them all." 

Unbelief has no joy. Infidelity never sings. In- 
stead of gloom attaching to the religion of the Bible, 
joy is as natural to it as singing is to the birds in the 
morning. The history of Christianity in the darkest 
and most dreadful of its struggles never fails to reveal 
the glad shout of its defenders. 

Its inspiring psalms have never sounded sweeter, 
nor showed more fully that Christians have a joy 
not born of earth, nor dependent upon external cir- 
cumstances, than when the stars had gone out of the 
sky, and the darkness filled it. To these, then and 
now, Christianity giveth songs in the night. 

As well go to an iceberg for heat as to infidelity for 
joy, but who opens his heart and life to Christ, sees 
the windows of heaven thrown up and hears celes- 
tial music, as of harpers harping with their harps. In- 
fidelity puts no harp into man's hand, no song into his 
soul, and furnishes no inspiring, comforting music as 
he steps down life's weary way; hopeless and cold, it 
puts no halo of immortality about the dying bed, nor 
ever blushes the gloom of the grave with the music of 
the victory and joy of a better world. Holy, perma- 
nent joy, is utterly wanting in infidelity; but through 
all the temple of God, on earth and in heaven, its 
anthem rolls with a harmony unbroken and inex- 
haustible. 



2IO VITAL QUESTIONS. 

At creation's dawn the morning stars sang together, 
and all the sons of God shouted for joy; and when 
Christianity has built the new heavens and the new 
earth, a doxology will voice the great triumph. 

And what more shall I say, for the time fails me to 
speak of faith as a condition of salvation, a gift of God, 
and the noblest and most masterful faculty of the 
human soul ; and of peace, that gentle touch of God's 
hand which hushes fear and composes the soul into a 
majesty of strength and courage in the most startling 
commotions of life, and in the calm of which death 
itself is discrowned; and of holiness, that strange new 
word in this world, in which God's face and purpose 
are alike mirrored, and before whose dazzling splen- 
dors infidelity pales and falls as if smitten by the 
lightnings of heaven. All these belong to Christianity; 
they are its glory as jewels are the glory of a crown, 
its testimony to the claims it makes, and the unfailing 
prophecy of the achievement of its purpose. 

Tell me, where else will you find these — and in con- 
trast with infidelity, what is your verdict? I submit, 
can such a religion be other than true, or may we ven- 
ture to find its authorship in any one else than God? 

Second. The power and excellence of the Christian 
Faith appear in its purpose and ability to regenerate 
man and restore order in this world. If Christianity 
has not come to renew and restore humanity, it has no 
mission. Its Founder announced his purpose in these 
words — The Son of mail has come to seek and to save 
that which was lost. — Luke xix. 10. The Apostle an- 



EXCELLENCE OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. 211 

nounces the same great purpose in these words — This 
is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that 
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners. — i Tim. 
i. 15. Regeneration is distinctive of the Bible religion. 
It has come to make all things new. This doctrine, by 
which Christianity is set apart from and transcends all 
other religions, and in which its excellence and power 
are illustrated in such a marked way, is exceedingly 
offensive to the unrenewed man, but it is because he 
needs it so much. We may easily decide upon the 
merits of Christianity as a renewing force in man and 
in the nations, by the observance of results on every 
hand. 

Many have been the philosophies and inventions of 
men, by which effort has been made to improve the 
character and the condition of mankind ; but the best 
of them have failed. Maclaurin speaks justly when he 
says: " History showeth the weak and contemptible 
efficacy of the sublimest philosophers of the heathens, 
when it is encountered with inveterate corruptions or 
violent temptations. How many of them that spake 
of virtue like angels, yet lived in a manner like brutes ; 
whereas in all ages poor Christian plebeians, unpol- 
ished by learning, but earnest in prayer, and depend- 
ing upon grace, have in comparison of these others, 
lived rather like angels than men, and shown such an 
invincible steadfastness in the practice of virtue as 
shameth all the philosophy in the world." If the best 
of human schemes of philosophy fail in this work of 
moral regeneration, how shall that feeblest of all human 



212 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

pretense, that enemy of restraint, of order and purity 
— infidelity — succeed ? Where or when has it shown 
any faculty for the redemption of man, and the reali- 
zation in this world of the song with which the angels 
filled the peaceful sky over the manger of Christ ? Is 
it not its purpose to throw off restraint, to put license 
in the place of liberty, and to give free sweep to the 
world's sin and woe ? 

I submit, is not its history written in the jet-black 
ink of violence, blasphemy, and ruin? Give one com- 
munity up to infidelity, and another to Christianity; 
let each do its best after its legitimate methods ; and 
then looking for such fruit as order, virtue, honesty, 
sobriety, purity, safety, and prosperity, a proper civili- 
zation, and a permanent hope, and which will lay the 
golden sheaf at your feet? Plutarch was right when 
he wrote: "You would sooner build a city in the air 
than cause a state to subsist without religion." Chris- 
tianity in the home, in society, in the nations, means 
loyalty to law, the coronation of justice in all relations, 
the practice of everything that promotes righteousness, 
prosperity and happiness ; and it means this, not be- 
cause like other religions it commands worship, and 
reveals God, but because it puts man's heart in proper 
relation to the Lord Jesus Christ. In the moral and 
spiritual it makes him a new creature, to love the good 
he once hated, and to hate the evil he once loved. So 
radical and unmistakable is this change, that the only 
things analagous in nature are birth and resurrection. 
Who does not know that Christianity has often won 



EXCELLENCE OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. 213 

its sublimest victories, and started the song of its new 
life in communities that were most surrendered to vice 
and unbelief, and in men who were most hardened and 
debauched? There have been homes and communi- 
ties so abandoned to vice and crime as to be a smoke 
in the nostrils of morality and decency. ,, 

Into such communities the messenger of the Cross 
has gone from the beginning, and under the strange 
power of the Gospel, again and again these places 
have been cleansed, and the wild wilderness made to 
blossom as the rose; men and women have been 
recovered to their right minds, and the heart swept 
clean began to speak the praise of God, and the life to 
witness for His name and truth. What did it? It was 
the zvord of faith which we preach. A mighty wind 
blew from the opening heavens. God breathed upon 
the slain, they were born again, and the standard of 
Christianity was lifted up. I submit, does not Chris- 
tianity bring men to God? 

Do not the facts of history and the most trustworthy 
experience of mankind confirm its doctrine and power 
of regeneration? Whom shall we believe, if not those 
in whom the dominion of sin has been broken, in 
whom the best growth is in grace and in the knowl- 
edge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and who 
pointing daily to the citadel of their faith say — This is 
the victory that overcometh the world. Infidelity has had 
a long trial, with much to its advantage. Tell me what 
nation has advanced in prosperity, in just government, 
in education and morals, under its direct influence? 



214 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

What community has it purified and adorned with 
sobriety, industry, culture, and social respectability? 
what home has it sweetened and girded with safety? 
what broken heart has it ever comforted ? what fallen 
life has it ever rescued, and filled with noble inspira- 
tion, set heavenward in its march ? Oh no, it has no 
record of this sort. As well stand over the silent 
graves of the dead, and calling for witnesses expect 
them to answer, as to look for any frank and favorable 
response from infidelity to questions like these. In 
the summary which I quoted from the Apostle, we 
have the fruit of redemption, the masterly elements 
of Christian manhood. It is impossible for any 
right-minded man to stand up unblushed and witness 
against them. Let me repeat them again, that they 
may be imprinted upon memory as by the finger of 
God. The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy \ peace, long- 
suffering, gentleness, goodness , faith, meekness, temper- 
ance. What a girding that for a human soul and life 
—what a diadem with which to adorn character! It is 
the new name written on the forehead, the white stone 
blazing on the brow, by which the children of the 
King are easily distinguished. It is the weakness, the 
clear test of the temper of infidelity, that it is set to 
uproot and destroy the Divine life and blessed over 
ture of grace, out of which this cluster of excellence 
and power alone can come. Wide and marked is the 
contrast between its ruin, and the essential holiness, 
the compassionate and unsoiled spirit, and the Divine 
purpose of our holy faith. My heart is comforted, my 



EXCELLENCE OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. 215 

faith is strengthened, my hope is enlarged, as I behold 
in the character, the mission and splendid results of 
Christianity, the constant fulfillment of the Redeemer's 
promise — Behold, I make all things new. 

Third. The excellence and power of Christianity are 
manifest in its faculty of adaptation, not only to man's 
nature and wants, but to every nation on the face of 
the whole earth. 

How remarkable is not this ! — manifestly the more 
so because it is peculiar to Christianity. It is its own 
supreme distinction. Who thinks of making a con- 
quest of the world in behalf ot Buddha, Confucius, or 
Mohammed? These have given no Son, no Saviour, 
to die for the world. They partake of the limitation 
of their founders, and so utterly lack the heart for 
such a sacrifice. They have neither desire nor ability 
to meet the deepest wants of the human soul. How 
different with that religion whose Author could say — 
All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. 

Nations and people differ in habits and tastes, in 
methods and purpose, but is it not singular that there 
should be sufficient unity in the race to have a com 
mon need, a soul yearning after God, and to find in 
Christianity a common and adequate remedy? It is 
clear that a religion that claims to be from God must 
be cosmical in its faculty and purpose. It must show 
itself able to master human nature at its worst, and 
out of it construct the noblest manhood. I know of 
nothing of which the history of Christianity in the 
world is a stronger confirmation. Christianity has a 



2l6 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

mission to the world. Its scope cannot be determined 
by this or that race or tongue. It is God's gift to 
humanity. Its Founder claims the heathen for an in- 
heritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for a 
possession, and the banners of that universal triumph 
are constantly waving in every breeze. Where is the 
people to-day on this broad earth, who are not re- 
ceiving, or have not received, the Gospel ? The com- 
mission of the heralds of the Cross requires them to 
go into all the world, and why this but because all 
the world needs Christ, and Christ alone is adequate 
to the need ? Infidelity is weak and must fail, because 
it fails to satisfy the nature of man at his best, and can 
only be recognized by every truly enlightened mind as 
an adverse force violating the better impulses of the 
soul, and in no extremity competent to afford ade- 
quate relief. 

Christianity on the other hand comes to all, and by 
its masterly faculty of adaptation wins from all. Learn- 
ing and wealth, numbers and station, sin and crime, 
armies and potentates, persecution and exile, law, phil- 
osophy and art, have all withstood it, but over all the 
Christian Faith has pushed forward until the Roman 
world, and other empires and nations since, have been 
brought cheerfully to own the sway of the Prince of 
Peace. 

This is the mystery that has followed the march of 
Christianity from the beginning. Two facts alone 
solve the significant problem. Christianity is from 
God and for man. To angels it would not be suited. 



EXCELLENCE OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. 2\J 

They must delight in it, as they delight in all God 
does, and it is no little part of their joy that through 
God's gracious intervention lost men are recovered to 
their joyous companionship. They cannot use it as 
we do, because they are not fallen as we are; but they 
must hail it for the love which inspires it, and for the 
perfection and joy in which it ultimates. Their envi- 
ronment differs from ours ; as yet they have much with 
which we have nothing in common. It is the un- 
spoken excellence and power of our Divine religion 
that it is so entirely suited to us. Infinite wisdom is 
no less manifest in it than infinite love. It was an as- 
tonishing wonder to the varied peoples present on the 
day of Pentecost because they heard the Lord's heralds 
speak in tongues native to each. Ah, it is the distinc- 
tion of the religion of the Holy Ghost ! To Christian- 
ity belongs the gift of tongues, and the endowment of 
a wisdom more than human. Whether it come to th^ 
cultured or to the illiterate, to the native or to the 
foreigner, it never wants for the right word, and the 
remedy is one, for the need is one. We have a com- 
mon experience of temptation, of sin, and of trial. 
There is a universal defection, as there is a universal 
sorrow. It is the Bible religion, and it alone, that 
comes to our rescue and comfort in all of these. Have 
we anxiety from a sense of guilt, from loss of earthly 
gain ? are we sad from bereavements that have left us 
quite alone ? are we hindered by the growing infirmi- 
ties of age and the waste of sickness, or are we timid 
at the approach of death? No matter — Christianity 
10 



2l8 VITAL QUESTIONS. 

meets the case in every instance where unbelief does 
not bar its way. All of these go down at the touch of 
its sceptre, and one by one the shackles of every bond- 
age drop from the soul, and it shouts its great and 
noble freedom in Christ. After this, it seems, it should 
not be difficult for every young man, or for any man, 
to choose between infidelity and Christianity. Do you 
still ask for tangible evidence confirming the truth of 
Christianity? If it were to prove the being of God, 
we might point to the stars ; as it is, we say humbly 
and confidently, look at those, a glorious army on this 
side of the flood and on that, who are to shine as the 
brightness of the firmament, and as the stars forever 
and ever. Still better and even more convincing may 
I bid you — Taste and see that the Lord is good. That 
test honestly made never disappoints. How should 
we not hail our glorious heritage in the religion of 
Jesus as God's loving, adequate ministry to man's every 
need ! Who has this has all — he shall hunger no more, 
neither thirst any more. Blessed be God, it is His own 
promise that the gates of hell shall not prevail against 
this holy faith. The permanence of Christianity is as- 
sured, assured by the promise of God, and as certainly 
by its own indestructible elements of excellence and 
power; they are of God, inwrought with His own life, 
stable as His throne, and in the diadem of His Son, 
and in the glory of His saints, they will shine when 

" Seas shall waste, the skies to smoke decay, 
Rocks fall to dust, and mountains melt away." 

Infidelity will resist this religion to the end, but it 



EXCELLENCE OF THE CHRISTIAN FAITH. 219 

will go on praying for its enemies, saving Souls, regen- 
erating nations and ushering in His reign, who is over 
all God's blessed forevermore. Beside this religion 
which, in its excellence and power, proves nothing 
more than that it came down from God out of heaven, 
we have no compensation in any man-devised system, 
— certainly none in empty, helpless, hopeless infidelity. 
Patrick Henry never was wiser, never so eloquent, as 
when he stood before the parting curtain behind 
whose palpitating folds eternity begins, and said : " I 
have now disposed of all my property to my family. 
There is one thing more I wish I could give them, and 
that is the Christian religion. If they had that, and 
I had not given them one shilling, they would have 
been rich ; and if they had not that, and I had given 
them all the world, they would be poor." May you, 
dear reader, think as he, and remember the words of 
a greater than he — What shall it profit a man if he 
shall gain the whole ivorld and lose his own soul? — 
Mark viii. 36. 



Hoi 



